I ship Boba Fett with (insert name here)
by FettsOnTop
Summary: One-shot Boba Fett shipping fodder. Characters are in the chapter titles. REQUESTS ARE NOW CLOSED. Thanks for all the new rarepairs you monsters.
1. Darth Vader

"Why are they here?"

Two stormtroopers stepped in front of him, blocking his path. It wasn't a question of whether he could get past them, but a question of whether he _should_. What kind of mood was Vader in today?

"Leave us," the sith lord commanded, and Boba could almost smell their sweaty relief through their armor. The troopers left, leaving him alone in a sterile imperial office with Darth Vader.

"You always come to me first," Boba continued, holding his ground as the sith moved toward him. "You don't need a bunch of fumbling idiots spooking Solo and driving him underground. I'll find the _Millennium Falcon_ and you'll get them alive."

"Will I?" Vader didn't stop until they were barely an arm's width apart, looming over Boba like a dark shadow. "I find myself less certain of your restraint these days."

"If you trust me, you trust my methods," Boba growled. "I know when restraint is needed and I know when it's not."

"I would like to believe that." Vader raised his hand, a gesture that produced the same chill in his blood as every other being, but he didn't move. He watched that black-gloved hand from behind his visor as it came in and then fought the urge to swallow when it settled at his throat.

The span of the hand was impressive on it's own. Vader's fingers wrapped around Boba's neck in a way that made him feel uncomfortably fragile, but they didn't squeeze. The sith lord said nothing, the only sound in the room was the rasp of his breathing through his respirator as his hand moved down and spread over Boba's breastplate.

Then it went lower. If Boba looked down, he would be able to see long, black-clad fingers against his stomach, but he didn't look down. He kept his attention on the oblique black mask in front of him.

At least he could swallow now, without drawing Vader's attention to it. Without looking weak. Or eager.

His hand lifted as it bypassed his belt, and returned to cover the curved piece of duraplast protecting his groin. "Your restraint," Vader said slowly, his words labored. "Will not be needed right now."

Oh. _That_ kind of mood.


	2. Poe Dameron

"So. You're the emissary she sent."

Poe found himself standing a little straighter as Fett strode into the room. He didn't look like the head chieftan of an entire system. His armor was the same style as the other Mandalorians he had seen, but older, more dated. Scratched and dented. The man could easily camouflage himself in a scrapyard.

"I'm Captain Poe Dameron," he answered, a little surprised when the older man went right past him. "And you must be Boba Fett."

"I must be." He tossed his helmet on a cot in the corner opened a panel on the opposite wall. "You wasted your time coming here."

"She said you'd say that."

Fett turned back around with a round biscuit in his hand and a smirk on his face. "That sounds about right." His cool brown eyes gave Poe a once over. "And she thought you were the right man for this pointless errand. How's that feel?" He took a bite of the biscuit, somehow injecting scorn and a little amusement into the simple gesture.

"I volunteered." Poe had always had a certain fascination with Mandalorian people and culture. They had some legendary pilots in their history, and the word in the alleys and cantinas was that Mandal Motors was creating some visionary new ship tech behind closed doors. Any potential alliance could be a turning point for the Resistance.

But there was the other things. Things that Leia told him during what she called "the unverified gossip briefing." In Fett's bounty hunting days he worked for the gangster Jabba the Hutt, and during a brief infiltration of Jabba's palace, Leia had heard some interesting things about Boba Fett from the dancers and slaves.

Maybe not pertinent things, necessarily, but very interesting things.

"You want one?"

Poe's attention snapped back to the _Mand'alor_. The older man held up the half-eaten biscuit and raised a questioning eyebrow.

"No. Thank you. I've eaten."

"I never seem to have time to eat these days." Fett grumbled, momentarily abandoning his meal for a disposable water pack.

"You have a lot going on?"

"You could say that. Did the princess tell you what happened to the last emissary she sent?"

"She said he defected."

" _Fekking_ right. Found himself a nice Mandalorian husband and became a baker. Made these." He picked up his biscuit again. "I know some young men, if you're interested."

Poe smiled before he could help himself, and then shook his head. "I don't see myself ever getting married."

"Good. The more you have, the more you have to lose." Fett took one last swig of water and set down the canteen. "My supper break's over. Give the princess my regards."

"I'm-" It wasn't the smoothest transition, but Poe plunged ahead. "I'm more into older men anyway."

He found himself focusing on the _Mand'alor's_ gloved hand as it slowly withdrew from the neck of the canteen and settled at his belt. When Poe raised his eyes to Fett's face, he was relieved to see a shadow of amusement on the man's face.

"So that's her plan? Send me the prettiest face and the tightest ass the Resistance has to offer?"

Heat crept into Poe's cheeks, but he held the other man's gaze. Maybe if he played this carefully, he'd get to see that Mandal Motors tech. "No. This wasn't part of her plan."

"Hm." Fett took a step toward him, his eyes measuring but no longer cool. "Remember that, when you wake up tomorrow morning and want to try on my helmet."


	3. Bodhi Rook

To be honest, he'd panicked. He saw the troopers walk into the cantina, saw them stop and talk to the bartender. They started moving in his direction and he turned his head to the stranger at the bar beside him. "So…come here often?"

"I'm not here to talk," the man growled in response. There was no drink in front of him, so apparently he wasn't here for that either.

"I just-"

"Say one more word to me and you're going to find out what that bar tastes like."

"But-"

He was a man of his word, and _kriffing_ fast at that. The only warning Bodhi got was an exasperated sigh before a hand came down on the back of his head and there was dazzling explosion of pain over his entire face.

He saw stars, and not the kind of stars he was hoping to see tonight. _I'll never get to Jedha at this rate._

Apparently the management didn't appreciate the commotion, because the next thing Bodhi knew he was out on the street, watching through blurred, bloody vision as the stranger walked away from him.

The stormtroopers hadn't given him a second glance.

"Hey," he called out to the retreating figure. "Thanks."

It barely registered in his mind that the stranger was returning before he was knocked backwards on the dirty street. He looked up into the muzzle of a blaster pistol and his throat seized up. "No! Please! I meant it, I wasn't-"

The blaster disappeared as suddenly as it had appeared, and the man dropped to one knee beside him. His eyes were dark and sharp, and there was something strangely familiar about his face, even though Bodhi was sure they'd never met. It made him think about one the old Imperial training modules he had to complete during his training, but he couldn't say why.

The stranger offered his hand. "Come with me."

He had a ship. A weird little firespray-class patrol ship. "Can it jump?" Bodhi asked, still thinking about Jedha.

"Yeah. It can jump." He also had a surprisingly well stocked medkit. "You know there are other ways to get someone's attention," he said as he helped Bodhi clean the blood off his nose and chin. The speed and the brutal efficiency was gone from his hands now.

"I was trying to avoid someone. Kind of a delicate situation."

"Ex-boyfriend?" His thumb trailed down Bodhi's cheek and brushed over his lips.

"Close enough. I guess." He laughed a little, proof that the painkiller was kicking in. His pulse picked up as the other man leaned closer.

"Someone you're afraid of."

It wasn't a question. "Yes."

"You're not my usual cargo," the stranger said, a wry smile pulling up one corner of his mouth. "But if you've got somewhere to go, I could-"

There was a sharp chime, and his host took a step back. "Have to check that. Might be work." He turned away, his head bowed over his commlink.

Bodhi looked around the cargo hold of the little ship, seeing for the first time the secure holding cells built into the wall. Whatever his new friend transported, it was dangerous. Then his eyes fell on the armor tucked into a cubby. Combat armor. Serious stuff. "What kind of work do you do?"

The other man turned around and Bodhi stopped breathing when he saw the projection on his commlink. There was his own undamaged face, a still holo from his Imperial ID. There was a price next to his name. A bounty posting. " _That_ kind of work," the man said. "Bodhi Rook, is it? I'm Boba Fett."


	4. Qui-Gon Jinn

"You never told me what you were doing here."

Boba glanced over at the man sitting on the log beside the fire, holding his hands outstretched as if he could feel the warmth of the flames. As if he were actually there.

"Because I don't talk to ghosts," Boba muttered, realizing too late that the statement in itself was a form of conversation. He heaved a sigh and shut his eyes tight. It didn't work. The Jedi was still there. "Why are _you_ here?" he snarled.

"Oh, I suppose it's curiosity. My old master, who you would have known as Count Dooku, used to tell a story about your father, Jango Fett. It was one of my favorites. I always hoped to meet him, someday."

Boba tilted his head back and looked up at the stars above the tall, wispy treetops. "When did you die? Before or after him?"

"Years before. And I was much older than I appear now." The ghost Jedi picked up a stick and poked at the fire, sending a shower of sparks upward.

"Stop doing that."

"Why?"

"Because you're not here. You're not _real_."

"And yet, you might be surprised at what I can do." The man had the gall to smile at him, a wide, warm smile. "Your pain called me here. You saw someone. Another clone. He reminded you."

"Go away," he responded through gritted teeth.

Instead, the Jedi moved closer, sitting on the ground beside him. "Would you like a hug? You'll be able to feel it. It won't feel exactly like a real hug, but-"

Boba's hand struck out, a blow that would have caught the man right in the throat and knocked him on his back if he'd actually been there. Instead his hand passed right through the Jedi and he fell forward on his hands and knees. He grimaced at his own stupidity.

"You're solid when you want to be, huh?"

"Well, I'm dead. There have to be some benefits." Ghostly fingers touched his cheek, and it felt so close to real that Boba jerked back.

"The way Dooku described your father…he never said so directly but I always thought that perhaps he found him to be handsome. Looking at you now, I believe I was right."

Boba stared in disbelief at the Jedi. "Are you… _hitting_ on me?"

"It occurred to me that maybe you just need to feel better." He said it with an air of complete confidence, like it was a perfectly normal conclusion. "My master shared many things with me, things were not always in line with the rules of the Jedi Order." The Jedi moved closer, his incorporeal gaze somehow piercing. "For example, he believed in the healing power of touch."


	5. Winter Celchu

"I'm not who you think I am." The words were slightly muffled, as Winter's cheek was against the wall, but she hoped the bounty hunter who'd just burst into her hotel room and disarmed her in seconds could hear them.

She knew who _he_ was, or at least who he claimed to be. Whether or not he was the same Boba Fett who was thought to have died the pit of Carkoon was the subject of some debate in the Outer Rim. After all, who could identify a man whose face was always hidden behind a helmet?

He released her arm abruptly, and she caught a quick glimpse of him moving across the room.

No. Not the closet.

Her heart dropped as his arm rose, pointing her snub-nosed blaster pistol precisely at her head without turning his helmet an inch in her direction. "Stay."

A 360-view scope. Maybe heat vision too? He drew his own pistol and bumped the closet door panel with the butt of it. "Please," she said. "They're children!"

Jacen and Jaina were still huddled on the floor where she'd left them, but Anakin was standing up. At three, he was just tall enough that the hanging clothes brushed the top of his head.

All three stared fearfully up at the armor-clad bounty hunter, who immediately holstered his pistol. Winter's gun was tucked into his belt. And then Fett did something truly surprising. He removed his helmet.

"It's all right," he said to the children. "You can come out."

They all looked at Winter, who nodded but didn't dare take her hands off the wall.

The bounty hunter attached his helmet to his belt, and took a small paper package out of one of his pockets. "Here."

It was the old fashioned kind of candy, the kind made from hardened syrup or honey. Winter doubted that the children had ever seen anything like it, but they each accepted a stick. "Thank you," Jacen said.

Fett nodded politely, addressing the five-year old as if he were a tiny adult. "Should I give one to your mom?"

"That's my aunt."

His attention shifted back to Winter, and his piercing dark eyes registered unexpectedly in her perfect memory. He was a clone. Too young to have fought in the Clone Wars, but there was no mistaking that face. "Would you like one?" He drew another stick from the paper.

It gave her permission to lower her hands and move away from the wall, so she accepted the candy. It seemed to be made out of some sort of very dark syrup, but it was pleasantly sweet. The children certainly seemed to be enjoying it. "Thank you." She gestured boldly at his belt. "Could I have my gun back?"

"Maybe later." He seemed a little amused by her. "Body double _and_ babysitter?"

"I'm someone she trusts." She took a deep breath and chose her words carefully. "So now that you know…"

"The contract doesn't include you."

Her eyes went to her charges, happily munching on candy sticks.

"They're children," he said, echoing her words.

Winter tilted her head to one side and made a show of studying him. "A bounty hunter with a sense of honor. Remarkable."

"Their mother made some powerful enemies," he said, his voice low and sober. "You should avoid using her codes, even in friendly systems."

"Thanks for the advice." She raised her eyebrows at him. "Have you ever considered a different line of work? Maybe a security consultant?"

The corner of his mouth twitched up and for one ludicrous second she almost thought they were having a moment. Then his eyes dropped, and he took his helmet from his belt. "I'll leave your gun outside the door."


	6. Darth Maul

Maul considers most humans to be weak, and ones that aren't weak are treacherous, like his old master. If there's a lone exception, a solitary island in a sea of complications and flaws, it's Boba Fett.

There's a simplicity to the man, a singular focus in the way he operates. He has the independent and pragmatic nature of his genetic source, but lacks Jango's ties to a culture and a system. Boba Fett has no home.

And because of that, Maul finds his company soothing. The moment he senses his presence is akin to a cool breeze. His own solitary, peaceful island.

He's not the only one who appreciates it.

Sidious' currentapprentice has been calling on Fett more and more. Maul can feel those little traces of Vader in the bounty hunter's presence, like the scent of another lover.

"I don't like you working for him," he growls into the back of Fett's neck.

"You don't have to like it."

They aren't really lovers. Even if Maul were physically capable of something resembling sex, Fett seems to have no inclination.

This is their arrangement: The bounty hunter comes to his residence when it suits him, removes his armor and most of his clothing, and they lay together on the pallet that serves as Maul's bed.

Fett has to be almost asleep for it work. He lays on his side and Maul curls around his back, the coldness of his robotic legs occasionally producing a grunt or a shift in his bed-mate's position. And then when he's just on that edge of slumber, Maul enters his mind and creates the dream. It's the same dream every time.

The Jedi, Mace Windu, falls into the dust of the Geonosian arena, a perfect scorched circle on his forehead. The rest of the Jedi are defeated, one by one. Maul lingers the longest over Kenobi's death, so long at times that Fett elbows him in half-conscious irritation.

The Separatists are triumphant. The Jedi Order is decimated. Jango Fett leaves the planet with a hefty reward, courtesy of Count Dooku. He leaves alone.

Maul does wonder why Boba Fett does not exist in his own dreams.

But it doesn't matter. For a little while, they both have what they want. Fett has his vengeance.

And Maul has his island.


	7. Wedge Antilles

Wedge was on his way out when he saw the man sitting by the window. He wasn't sure what drew his attention, maybe it was just the way the light filtered in around him, or the fact that he was sitting alone in the recovery wing. Most of the other patients were gathered in groups around the tables.

"Hey," he said as he approached. "Have we met?"

Cool brown eyes met his, but without a hint of recognition. "Don't think so."

"Are you sure? I'm Wedge. Wedge Antilles."

"Never heard of you."

Wedge almost laughed, but the man resumed staring out the window as if the conversation was over. Not that he couldn't be sincere, but in the days following Endor, Wedge had grown accustomed to every rebel soldier recognizing his name.

He looked again at the pale bacta patches completely covering the man's right cheek and neck until they vanished beneath a loose shirt. "Are you one of De'voya's patients?"

That got him a slight nod.

"They say she's the best in the galaxy. Friend of mine is under her care too. I was just visiting him in the burn unit. Are you sure we haven't met?"

"We haven't met."

"There's just something about your face. I can't place it. Were you ever in the Imperial Navy?"

"I wasn't. Had some relatives that were." There was a certain wariness in his response.

"Hey. This isn't a loyalty test, okay? I've got friends and family on the other side too. So where were you injured? Endor?"

"Does it matter?" His flat, bitter tone didn't really surprise Wedge. The damage done by combat wasn't just physical, especially if was painful and traumatic. Poor bastard could probably use some company. After a moment of hesitation, Wedge sat down in the chair opposite the man. "Look, I've got some time to kill, and I know recovery can be a long, boring journey. You want to play cards or something? You play sabacc?"

"No."

"Me neither. I mean, I know how, but I'm terrible at it. Captain Solo once took a week's pay off me in twenty minutes." That got a flicker of recognition, which was slightly annoying. Apparently he'd heard of Han Solo. "He's a real asshole, by the way. Don't know if you've met him." He said it with a smile, and he was pleased when he got a faint smirk in return.

"I have."

Not a bad looking guy, not that Wedge was trolling a burn unit looking for dates. The man shifted slightly in his seat. "There's a holochess board at the front desk."

"Sounds great. I'm terrible at that too, but I like to watch the pieces fight." Wedge gave him a quick wink, and the man held his gaze for what seemed like longer than necessary. "Okay then," he said, clearing his throat a little as he rose from his seat. "I'll go get it."


	8. Eeth Koth

"Are you all right?"

Boba nods without looking up, but his ears are attuned to the sound of the other Zabrak's footsteps, and the vibrations he can feel through the floor. He's sitting with his knees tucked up and his arms around them, as if he's trying to make himself smaller.

It also happens to be a convenient way to hide the blaster tucked inside his broad leather belt.

The Zabrak sits beside him, not too close. "He won't bother you again, I've seen to that."

Now it's time for the look. Round eyes, compressed lips. Uncertainty. A little curiosity. "I don't know why you would help me, but thanks."

The Zabrak tilts his head to one side, looking him over with amber eyes that are both like human eyes and not. "It's a cold, cruel galaxy. We all need a little light now and then." His hand on Boba's shoulder is gentle. Reassuring.

Jango taught him this game as a child. He told Boba about the flightless _netuyc_ birds that roamed the plains of Concord Dawn and how they pretended to be injured to lure in scavengers before attacking with their sharp beaks.

"Weakness can be a powerful lure," he hold his son. "Some will follow it with good intentions, and some will follow it with bad ones. But even the most guarded prey won't be able to resist."

Eeth Koth is the definition of guarded prey. The former Jedi has taken a long time to track this far, and even longer to get close to. Boba had to become someone weak. A poor destitute clone, cast aside by the Empire.

He doesn't like removing his helmet these days, but it gets results.

"Do you have somewhere to go?" Koth asks.

Boba swallows and looks away.

"I have a room. A sort of out-of-the-way place. You can stay with me tonight, if you want."

There's a new tone there, a rueful kind of acknowledgement that this could be interpreted as something other than altruism.

Boba was too young for those kind of games, but he remembers Zam Wesell teasing his father about how _exactly_ he brought in the Hydian bandit. He wonders sometimes what it would feel like, to be _that_ close to prey.

How wary should he be, an impoverished young man, going home with a kind stranger? Maybe he should act as if he expects to give his body up in gratitude, and let the Jedi demur. It might keep him off balance. Regardless of how he reacts, they'll never reach Koth's bed.

"I've caused you enough trouble."

"No trouble at all." There's a spark of something in the Zabrak's eyes, something that sends a chill of caution down Boba's spine.

After all, Jedi can play games too.


	9. Mara Jade

"Fett. I heard you were dead."

His helmet tilted barely in her direction. "Jade. Heard you were too."

Mara picked up her drink and moved from the bar to the back wall where the bounty hunter lurked. "You must be running short of employers these days. First Vader, and then Jabba. And now I hear Co'lick's syndicate is going belly-up."

"There's always another job."

Mara put her back on the wall beside him and glared a man who had the audacity to look her over as he passed by. When he swallowed and scurried away, she took another bracing sip of alcohol. "Good to know you haven't changed."

"Are you looking for work?"

"No, I'm here for the drinks. I love watered-down bantha piss." She raised her eyebrows at him. "You know what I can do. Maybe you've got something I could help you with."

"If I had something, I wouldn't be here."

She finished the last of her drink and squared her shoulders. "Well, kriff. Two out-of-work mercenaries. What do we do now?"

"You never handled boredom well." There was an undercurrent of amusement in his tone.

She turned to face him, her shoulder against the wall, her empty glass dangling from her fingers. "Yeah, well, you never handled me well when I was bored. Lucky for you I was young and didn't know what good sex was."

"You didn't know what good hygiene was either." His helmet tilted down towards her. "When I was in the sarlacc's gut, I kept thinking 'what is that smell and why is it so familiar?'"

Mara smiled and pushed off the wall. "I'll go pay my tab and we can leave. You can leave the helmet on. I think it's safe to assume you've only gotten uglier."


	10. Cassian Andor

The shrieking alarm stops as suddenly as it started, leaving behind a ringing silence in the spaceport bar. Gradually the chatter of the patrons and the clinking of glasses resumes as the stormtroopers gather in front of the sealed blast doors.

Just another day in the Galactic Empire.

Boba is sitting on one of the benches along the wall, the perfect vantage point to see who is and isn't unnerved by this new development. He sees a man leave the bar, very deliberately not looking at the doors. Their eyes meet.

Cassian Andor.

He's a rebel agent, but he keeps himself well below the radar, which means there's no price on his head. Not yet. They know a lot of the same shady people in the same shady circles, and they see one another often enough that Cassian knows him without his helmet.

He pauses at the table in front of Boba, drink in hand. "You know what this is about?"

"Worried?"

"I wasn't until I saw you."

It's almost a compliment. "Relax, Andor. You're not important enough for a lockdown."

Cassian shoots him a quick, irritated look, but no one's close enough to hear them. "What are you drinking?"

"Carbonated water with a mint shot." The stormtroopers are beginning to fan out through the room, keeping their distance. For now.

"Is it good?"

"Tastes like plasticine."

"Ha. Mind if I sit down?" He nods at the bench beside Boba, who issues permission with a tilt of his head. Ah. That's why the sudden interest in his presence and choice of drinks. He's blending in. A couple looks less suspicious than a lone person. Cassian drops down beside him, close enough that their shoulders touch.

He lifts his glass to his lips, using the motion as cover to watch the stormtroopers move through the crowd. Boba finds himself studying the line of his throat as he swallows.

Cassian clearly hasn't shaved in several days and his hair is long enough to cover his shirt collar in the back. Just the right length for someone to run their fingers through.

Boba puts his arm back along the bench, behind Cassian's taunt shoulders. The close proximity lets him appreciate at his leisure the other man's long lashes and high cheekbones. Somehow he's pretty and scuffy at the same time.

Cassian has to be aware of his gaze, but he doesn't look at Boba. Instead he switches his drink to his other hand and rests that hand casually on Boba's thigh. His fingers are long and slender, and there are callouses on the inner pads.

He has the hands of a sniper. Careful, precise. Always at a distance.

Boba moves his feet, letting his legs fall apart a little more. Cassian's hand slides down to the inside of his thigh, just above his knee. Close enough to be intimate, but not obscene.

A stormtrooper passes by them with hardly a glance, and a few minutes later the lockdown ends. Boba expects Cassian to move away at once, but he doesn't. In fact, he leans against him a little more, the warmth of his palm seeping through the heavy fabric of Boba's pants.

Finally, Cassian turns his head. "Fun's over," he says with a careful little smile. "Let's do it again some time."

"Let's," Boba agrees.

His hand draws back and his eyes sweep the room as he stands. A few seconds later Cassian has vanished in the crowd. Boba takes another sip of his drink. He doesn't notice the taste.


	11. Leia Organa

Getting into the medical facility took an obscene amount of money. Given the amount of strings Leia had to pull, palms she had to grease and favors she was forced to call in, it was easy to see how this facility had gained a reputation for discretion. She could only hope her efforts would be worth it.

The orderly who was temporarily in her employ took her up to the prosthetic wing and pointed silently to a door at the end of the hall. There were no other staff around and there was a still a good hour before the facility was technically open. As she approached the door she could hear a mechanical whir, punctuated by a few short beeps.

She opened the door, and the man who's prosthetic leg was currently undergoing maintenance by a med droid looked up sharply.

It was really quite an achievement. For the second time in her life, she had successfully tracked down Boba Fett.

"You can put that down," she said, referencing the blaster that was now aimed at her head.

"Give me one good reason to."

Leia didn't blame him for being annoyed. This was, at the very least, a gross invasion of his privacy. "I'm only here to talk," she told him. His dark eyes were sharp with suspicion, but he lowered the blaster. The med droid continued to work on his leg, undisturbed by the confrontation.

"You look pretty good for a man who was partially digested." They were both a good fifteen years older since their skirmish at the pit of Carkoon, but Fett was wearing nothing but a pair of tight black shorts, giving her a clear view of the extensive scarring the sarlacc's stomach acids left behind, not to mention the loss of his right leg from the knee down.

"You can drop the half-assed flattery," he growled in return. "What do you want from me?"

"I want to hire you."

"Not interested."

She tilted her head. "You're not even curious about the job?"

"No."

"Why?"

"You really have to ask?" His tone was biting. "I don't want anything to do with you, or your brother, or your husband. I'd rather cut my dick off and toss it back in the sarlacc pit."

Leia thought about correcting him in regards to Han. Technically, according to the laws of marital cohabitation, they were legally separated. Again. But that probably wouldn't matter to Fett.

"We were enemies once," she acknowledged carefully. "But I would expect a mercenary to understand that circumstances can alter relationships."

"A mercenary chooses who they work for," he returned coldly. "That's the entire _fekking_ point."

Leia exhaled in frustration. All this time and trouble and money. For this. "You don't have to like me to work for me. I need your particular expertise and I can pay you _very_ well for it." His only reply was stony silence. "Damn it, Fett, is there anything I can do to change your mind?"

He flinched suddenly, and a harsh, unguarded gasp of pain escaped him. " _Fierfek!"_

"There will be some discomfort," the med droid reported. "I must remind you that the use of pain injectors is recommended for this procedure."

"No," he responded through his teeth, his hands gripping the exam table edges hard enough to turn his knuckles white.

Leia looked away, wishing now that she'd found another way to do this. "I'm sorry about your leg," she said quietly, her eyes still averted. "As I said before, if there's anything I can do-"

"You can't kiss it and make it better," he snarled, followed by a rough kind of half-laugh. "Or maybe you can. That's it. That's what you can do."

Leia looked swiftly back at his face. He was smirking at her now, but his hands were still grasping table edges with visible effort. "You…want me to kiss your leg?" She asked, her eyebrows raised.

"No. A real kiss." He held her eyes. "And I'll _listen_ to your job offer."

Oh, she'd really pissed him off. That was clear. "Why that?"

"Because you won't do it." His shoulders jerked as the droid's instruments hit a non-prosthetic spot. "Sithspawn," he hissed, a rough edge in his voice. "And then maybe you'll leave me alone."

"I think you've severely underestimated what I will and won't do." Before she could change her mind, she closed the distance between them and pressed her lips firmly to his.

At first his mouth was slack with shock, but he recovered quickly. His hand was suddenly and unexpectedly at the nape of her neck, an advance that she parried by biting down almost savagely on his lower lip. They parted, and Fett winced a little as he touched the tender spot she left

Leia gave her own lips a swipe with her fingers, careful not to smudge her lipstick. "I should tell you right now that this job is not an _official_ part of any intelligence operation and the Republic is in no way aware of, or responsible for this mission." She paused to take a breath after that. "How much do you know about the First Order?"


	12. Ahsoka Tano

The door opened, but Boba didn't look up. "Go away."

"I brought you _dinner_ ," the young Torgruta snapped in response as she entered the small crew room and thrust the tray of rations at him.

He curled up into a tighter ball on the bunk. "I'm not hungry."

"Just eat something," Ahsoka insisted. "Master Plo says you have to."

"You can't make me eat."

She dropped the tray on the bunk and scowled at him. "Master Plo says I have to stay until you eat. So if you want me to leave, _eat something_."

Boba looked past her to the door she'd left open. He thought he could get past her. She was injured and didn't have her lightsaber on her. But he'd never be able to overpower Plo Koon. Despair clawed at his stomach, followed closely by shame.

This was his fault. He was stupid enough to get captured. Stupid enough to trust Hondo. No wonder Aurra left him behind. He wasn't a bounty hunter like his dad, he was just a stupid kid.

He sat up and took a protein stick from the tray. He wasn't hungry, but maybe if he choked this down, the padawan would leave. She rolled her eyes as if his reluctance was just too much to believe, and sat down on the edge of the bunk with a huff.

"Aren't you scared to sit that close to a murderer?" He sneered.

The glare she gave him was colder than a sheet of ice. "It's so weird. You look just like them, but you're nothing like them. I've never been around a clone I couldn't trust."

"You mean a clone you couldn't order around." He broke the stick in half and then in quarters. "They don't have a choice."

"They _want_ to serve the Republic."

"Because they were conditioned to. I grew up on Kamino, remember? They're canon fodder and the Jedi are the real murderers."

Ahsoka jumped to her feet. "YOU SHOT ME," she said at high volume. "You can't SHOOT ME and then lecture me about MORALS."

"Ahsoka!" Came a reproving voice from the direction of the cockpit.

"Sorry Master!" Her shoulders hunched and her lips pressed together in frustration. "Look. I can sense how badly you feel right now, and I'm not trying to make it worse. You're just so…"

"Honest?" Boba stuck a piece of the protein stick in his mouth and chewed determinedly.

"No. I was going to say 'annoying.'" She folded her arms over her chest. "Maybe you're right that the clones weren't given a choice. But you had a choice, and look what you did with your life."

"What else was I supposed to do?"

It gave him a little bit of satisfaction that she didn't seem to have an answer to that.

"What would you have done?" He asked. "If you couldn't be a Jedi?"

Her eyes widened slightly. They were such a bright, startling shade of blue. "I don't know," she said, her words sharp and a little defensive. "I wouldn't kill people."

Boba put the last piece of protein stick in his mouth. "I'm done," he mumbled around it. "You can go." The weird thing was, he didn't really want her to go.

"I don't have to go," she said in a softer tone. "I could stay for a little longer."

He shrugged as if he didn't care and curled up again on the bunk with his eyes closed, expecting to feel her weight lift from the edge.

But it didn't. He opened his eyes, just a crack. She was still sitting there. Boba closed his eyes again, and after a few seconds he felt the weight of a blanket being laid over him.


	13. Lando Calrissian

**Author's Note:** This ties into another Boba/Lando fic I wrote called _Bad Deal_.

* * *

When Lando left the casino floor at the Grand Mo'allah'ashu hotel, he did so with a smile and his usual swagger. In the privacy of the elevator, he closed his eyes, calculating his wins and losses and how much further he could go in the tournament without taking on more debt.

The thrill of the game fed him as long as he was in it, but coming down from that high was never easy. Usually it involved consuming a lot of alcohol, which was pretty much plan Aurek through Zerek for the rest of the night.

He exhaled as the elevator reached his floor and made his way to his suite. There was dirty smudge on the carpet outside his door, an unusual lapse by the housekeepers. And was he imagining it, or did the door panel look…different?

Lando entered in his code, and the door opened smoothly. It must the buzz from the sabacc table still messing with his head. He walked into the spacious suite, reserved for valued patrons of the casino, and his heart nearly stopped.

One of the amenities the room boasted was a large circular bathtub formed from gleaming white marble with gold leaf accents. The tub was currently in use, steam rising from the surface of the water and surrounding the man who was sitting in it with his arms nonchalantly draped over the edge.

"Hello, Lando." Boba Fett tilted his head to one side and the corner of his mouth curled up in a playful smirk.

Lando couldn't immediately reply, caught somewhere between shock and horrified attraction. "Fett," he managed, trying not to stare too much at the wet gleam of his arms and chest, or the little droplets of steam clinging to his jet black hair. "What are you doing here?"

"I thought that would be obvious."

He was clearly very pleased with his little ambush. Lando was still trying to convince his racing pulse that this wasn't about any of his current loans.

"This is…a social call?"

"I like that. Classy." His smile grew, enough to show a flash of white teeth.

"I need a drink." Lando went straight to the bar. His hands were shaking as he poured himself two stiff fingers of Corellian whiskey. " _Kriff._ You almost gave me a heart attack. You could have comm'd me first."

"Why?"

Lando gave a short laugh, but the bounty hunter didn't seem to be joking. His expression had shifted from playful to wary.

"Are you expecting someone else?"

It was a question posed with absolutely no inflection, but Lando didn't miss the sudden chill in the air. "No, I'm just surprised. I didn't know if I was ever going to see you again after that night in Port Mantel. You left without saying good-bye."

Fett shrugged. "I had work to do."

"You didn't even tell me your name. I had to ask around. You've…got quite a reputation."

"I could say the same of you."

"That's fair." Lando lifted his glass in a mock toast, feeling somewhat calmer now. "You want a drink?"

"No." He leaned back against the edge of the tub. "Join me."

Lando took a sip of whiskey and grinned at him. "What's the rush? You went to a lot of trouble for this little seduction scene. Let me enjoy it."

Fett leaned forward a little with one eyebrow lifted slightly. "Either you get in or I'm coming to get you."

He wasn't bluffing. A rush of adrenaline filled Lando's veins, the same feeling he got from a new sabacc hand. He slowly set down his glass, and started working on the clasp of his cloak.


	14. Barriss Offee

"Next." Barriss looked up from her datapad, and the hustle of the clinic faded into the background.

"That's me." The man looking steadily at her was familiar in a way that burned. In a way that wrapped around her throat and left her unable to move or breathe, let alone speak. "Just like old times," he said. "Meeting in the medbay."

 _Oh gods, Boba._

Conscious of the other patients waiting to be seen, she nodded and gestured toward the nearest exam booth. "In here, please." Once they were out of sight, she turned to him, her datapad clutched to her chest. "I'm…so glad…" she said quietly. "To see that you're alive and well. And…grown up."

His mouth tipped in a self-conscious smile. He was just a wiry youth, the last time she saw him. A tense, hardened boy in a prison jumpsuit. As one of the volunteer Jedi healers for the detention center, Barriss saw him every two cycles for his mandatory physical exam, and occasionally for other injuries that he refused to explain.

"I'm here for a scan," he said. "I was on Cato Neimoidia last week during the Arki'an Virus outbreak."

"Have you had any symptoms? Headache, nausea, dizziness?"

"Headaches. But I have those anyway."

"Any irritation or abnormally dry skin?"

He shook his head. Barriss laid down her data pad and took a sterilizing pad from the hover tray. "Roll up your sleeve, please." She could feel his attention, the way his eyes moved from the tray to his shirtsleeve to her face and then to the syringe in her hand.

"It really is like old times," he said.

"I thought about you often," she admitted. "Especially after…when it was my turn behind bars."

"I heard about that." His mouth twisted a little in some semblance of a smile. "Look at us. A couple of ex-convicts. In a world without the Jedi Order."

"I'm not sorry that the order is gone. But the cost…" She dropped her eyes, focusing on her task as she took the blood sample and slid it into the scanner. "The purge. The Empire…it all could have been avoided."

Boba said nothing to that. He rolled down his sleeve before he spoke again. "So this is what you do now? Work in a street clinic?"

"It's work and I enjoy it. What do you do?"

"I'm a bounty hunter."

"Oh, of course you are." It suddenly struck her. "Oh. Oh no."

"There's no price on your head. The Emperor has a standing bounty for Jedi…which you are not." He said the last part slowly and deliberately.

Relief washed over her. "Thank you, Boba." She had to tilt her head back to look fully up at him, another reminder of the time that had passed. He resembled the other clones, of course, but there was something very distinct about him, especially now. A confidence and a steadiness that was quite attractive.

The scanner beeped, and Barriss quickly scrolled through the results. "This all looks fine to me, but you can re-test again in ten days to be sure."

"Maybe I'll stick around for a while."

Barriss didn't miss his quick glance. "My shift ends in an hour. Maybe you'd like to come to my house for dinner?"

"Did you finally learn to cook?"

"Did I-"

"You used to sneak me food in the medbay," he reminded her. "Nut breads. Cakes. You said I had to eat them because something went wrong with the recipe." His head tilted to one side, his expression wry. "They always tasted fine to me though."

Barriss pressed her lips together in amusement. "I forgot about that. Yes, I think my cooking has greatly improved." She folded her hands and smiled at him. "But I could use a second opinion."


	15. Luke Skywalker

There he was again. Boba caught sight of him in the crowd, the Tatooine sun shining on his fair hair. Eighteen or nineteen at most, a wholesome young farm boy in a white tunic and tan pants.

The last time he'd seen him around Anchorhead, the boy had paused to look at his armor with clear interest before his father had pulled him away. "Stay away from bounty hunters," the old man advised gruffly.

Boba had rule about seducing dumb hicks anyway, but there was no harm in looking, especially when he had nothing better to do. Despite rumors of a possible Jedi in the area, Boba had found nothing concrete. So now he was killing time while his swoop bike charged, watching the boy join his group of friends.

He was clutching a dusty pilot's helmet in his hands, and they were all talking about a nearby canyon, pantomiming some event with wide motions and laughter. It seemed like the farm boy had done something remarkable, won some kind of race.

A tall young man with a mop of black hair called him "Luke" while he ruffled his hair. Luke beamed up at him, his face flushed with excitement, but the taller man dropped his arm almost immediately and leaned towards a slender girl with long hair.

Interesting.

Luke dropped his eyes and fiddled self-consciously with his helmet. Casting around for something else to look at, his eyes fell on Boba. His eyes were a startling shade of blue.

 _I can show you what it's like when a man actually wants you._

He hadn't spoken the words aloud, but Luke's lips parted, and his eyes remained fixed on Boba as if he could somehow _feel_ the thought. As if those blue eyes could pierce his helmet and catch the heat in his gaze. The color in the boy's cheeks deepened, and he quickly looked away. He focused on what one of his friends was saying and laughed just a second too late. His eyes flicked back over at Boba.

The alert sounded in his helmet, notifying him that his bike was charged. In Mos Espa, or even Mos Eisley, he could issue an invitation with the curl of his fingers. But this wasn't Mos Espa. This was Anchorhead, and the rule about seducing dumb hicks was a rule for a reason.

Maybe he would find his way back here someday. Or maybe Luke would take his piloting skills to a more profitable location. He wasn't likely to forget that face anytime soon.


	16. Aayla Secura

Aayla slept longer than she intended. When she opened her eyes, she saw the bright shaft of sunlight cast onto the wall by the skylights first, and then the dark head resting on her thigh.

She laid there for a moment, watching the rise and fall of his smooth, muscular shoulders. The comparison to the older clones was inevitable, but never once had she seen them like this. They were her men. There were boundaries she would not cross, not even for Bly, who both loved her fiercely and saw her as a symbol of all things he could never have.

Maybe that made it easier for him to pull the trigger, in the end.

Her life was never without the hum of cybernetics now, the price of her survival. Most of her chest and torso was synthetic, carefully maintained implants working alongside her remaining organs. It was off-putting to many beings, but not to the young man in her bed now.

He stirred, his body drawing tight as he woke and then settling in a more relaxed fashion. He lifted his head and peered at her with dark, curious eyes. "What time is it?"

"About two hours after dawn." Aalya stretched, reaching beneath her pillow as she did so. "What time are the Imperials arriving?"

He was fast, but she was faster, and the blaster was already in her hand. He looked down the barrel, his jaw tight. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'm sure you don't. Boba. Fett." She kept the blaster trained on his head as she pulled herself up into a kneeling position that mimicked his own.

His chest rose and fell a little quicker. "I told you. My name is-"

"Let's not do that." She would give him this, he had an excellent sabacc face.

"Why are you doing this?" He kept his eyes on her and his hands flat on the bed. "I thought we had a good time."

"It wasn't bad," she admitted. "It doesn't hurt that stalling looks a lot like patience and enthusiasm. But I'm not nearly as desirable to you as a pile of credits."

His mouth twitched in irritation. "You're insanely paranoid, you know that?"

"It's a lesson I learned the hard way."

He looked away briefly, as if he was weighing his options. "Are you sure you want it end like this?" He asked, his flat tone belayed by the simmering heat in his eyes and the flirtatious curl of his lips. His hand moved toward her leg, which she jerked away.

" _Kriff_. You're very good at that." She straightened her arm, pressing the tip of the blaster barrel into his forehead. "Now get out of my bed."

The seductive mask fell, replaced by annoyance. "When did you make me?"

"This is not question and answer time. _Out_."

Boba spread his hands in a gesture of surrender and moved to the edge of the bed, reaching for his pants in the same motion. "Just looking for pointers."

"I knew from the start."

"Liar."

"Do you really think any Jedi would forget about Jango Fett's first clone?"

His looked back at her, his mouth curled up on one side. "You might be surprised."

Her heart sank. "Who?"

"This isn't question and answer time," he taunted as he stood and fastened his pants. "You knew and you did this anyway. Not very Jedi-like of you."

He was still stalling. Aayla was sure she didn't need to explain to him all the ways she was no longer whole. "Be glad," she said coldly, the blaster still trained on him. "That a little of the Jedi ways remain with me. It would be much more efficient to kill you now."

He tilted his head in a slight nod of acknowledgement before he pulled his shirt over his head "Enjoy your freedom," he said as he stooped to collect his boots. "While it lasts."


	17. Rey

For the first few days, Rey thought she had killed him. It wasn't much of a life, being trapped in carbonite, sleeping away year after year, but it was still her decision to thaw him out, knowing full well that he might not survive it.

What she didn't anticipate was how long it would take for the hibernation sickness to abate. He was nearly catatonic, shivering and sweating while she hugged his side and tried to share her body's warmth. She peeled the compression suit from his body and urged him to move his limbs, to crawl if he had to. When he could manage a few stumbling steps, she took his hand and guided him. It took nearly eight days for his eyesight to return.

She talked to him, but he didn't say much back, something that remained long after the shivering and blindness had faded. "I'm Rey," she told him the first day he could sit up and eat.

"Bo."

His pod was well-insulated. It had to be, to survive the damage done to his ship before it was abandoned on Jakku. The technology was a good thirty years old but would have been very advanced at the time. Bo had to have been someone important in his past life, someone with access to that kind of equipment.

Rey had theories, of course. The most fantastic made him into a prince, the lone survivor of a dying world. She was sure she'd heard a story like that once, although in that one it was a princess. Perhaps he was a genius. A brilliant mind that someone sought to preserve.

When she allowed reality to creep in, she thought about the interior of the ship, and all the ways it reminded her of a prison.

But he didn't talk about it. He absorbed his surroundings in silence, and as soon as he was able, followed her out into the hills to scavenge with her. Rey knew he was older than her, even before he was frozen, but he always listened to her and did as she asked. He had the physical presence of a predator, moving steadily among the wreckage, his eyes always searching.

The other scavengers began to notice that her hauls were growing in size and value. Eventually two of them got curious enough to break into her shelter in the dead of night. It wasn't the first time Rey had to defend her home, but it was the first time someone almost died.

"Don't kill him," she told Bo, who had the scavenger pinned to the ground with a sharpened railspike at his throat. "It'll make things worse with the others." He fought as easily as he hunted in the wreckage, with a matter-of-fact efficiency and a complete lack of emotion.

The following day they unearthed a small cache of scout trooper armor. Bo picked up a chestplate and held it up to his own torso. "It'll fetch a good bit," she told him, "but if you really want to keep it…"

It was the first time she saw him smile.

He assembled a crude set out of the scattered armor and worked on it all evening, until it was too dark to see. When at last he laid down beside her, Rey curled into his warmth. He could have been a stormtrooper, before he was frozen. That would be the most benign of her current theories.

Every spare second from then on out, he worked on his armor. The helmet was clearly the most frustrating to him, but he kept at it. He fixed the commlink and rigged up a short range transmitter for Rey to carry on her belt. "What for?" She asked. "You haven't said a word to me in four days."

"I want to test the range. I'll go to the outpost with you tomorrow."

It was the longest sentence she'd ever heard him utter. "Stay close to me."

It was the first time he didn't listen to her. He disappeared as soon as their trading was done, and reappeared just whe she was starting to panic. He was carrying a cloth-wrapped bundle in his arms. "What is that?" She asked.

"A blaster."

"A _blaster_? How did you get a blaster?" Guns were almost as costly as fresh produce out here. "You didn't steal it, did you?"

"I scavenged it."

Rey hardly slept that night, sure that the blaster's owner would come for it. But no one came. When morning came, Bo went outside to relieve himself. She searched through his armor and found something else. A small data chip.

She loaded it into her ragtag little projector and sat cross-legged on the floor. It was a bounty posting for a Quarren thief, last seen on Jakku. The Quarren was armed with a blaster and considered to be dangerous. Half of the bounty would be rendered for proof of death.

She looked up as Bo re-entered the shelter. He folded his arms over his chest and said nothing.

"You're leaving, aren't you?"

"Yes."

"But…aren't we…" She didn't know the right word for it. She wanted to say 'married,' but she knew that wasn't exactly it. They'd never even kissed. Maybe she should have kissed him.

"I'd ask you to come," he told her. "But you won't."

"I can't." Rey scrambled to her feet and grabbed her gear. "I've got work to do."

He stepped into her path. "I won't forget. If you need help…" He touched the commlink on her belt. "You can get a signal to the planetary postings. I'll be watching."

"Just go." Rey pushed past him.

By the time she returned he was gone.


	18. Kylo Ren

He wakes up, and the galaxy is both different and exactly the same. But still he wakes up, after twenty-eight years of being frozen in carbonite. He has, as might be expected, a very severe case of hibernation sickness, but he's treated by the best the First Order has. Supreme Leader Kylo Ren spared no expense in bringing him back to life.

Boba was in his late thirties when he was frozen. Hibernation can't completely halt the aging process, but the med center staff puts his physical age closer to fifty than seventy. He's an oddity to them. The last surviving clone of Jango Fett. A relic from a bygone era.

Kylo Ren looks at him with fascination. He has questions about the old days. About Darth Vader. About the Empire. About his father.

Han Solo stuck his dick in the wrong family. Of course he would produce a Sith with poor impulse control.

After weeks of treatment and physical therapy, he's permitted to move around the base, usually under armed escort. He can feel the stares and hear the mummers. That's right, the bounty hunter who once froze Han Solo in carbonite escaped the sarlacc only to be frozen for close to three decades. The irony. Ha. Ha. _Ha_.

He can see what they're going for, but this isn't the Empire reborn. The First Order is fumbling and desperate the way it's supreme leader is when he summons Boba to his chambers. "Let me see your scars," he commands, wholly transparent in his desire to feel powerful.

Boba removes clothing until he's told to stop, and allows each fading mark to be petted and stroked. "Which ones…did my father cause?" Kylo's breathing is rapid, he's clearly aroused but he never makes a move. He barely seems to be aware of it. "I skewered him, you know. Right here." He pushes long, trembling fingers into Boba's skin.

It's sort of weird, considering his solitary former life, for _him_ to be the sexually experienced one.

"Your dad ever give you any scars?"

"Not ones that can be touched."

"What a shame." Eye contact is important. That much he remembers. So is honesty, especially when dealing with a Sith. Always tell the truth. Let them hear of it what they want to hear.

Darth Vader taught him that.

"Tell me about him," Kylo commands again, this time while they're laying in his bed. What Boba really wants is to rinse his mouth, maybe gargle something with alcohol in it.

"He recognized skill, and he used his resources well. None of the other high-ranking Imperials would deal with bounty hunters."

"You want to go back to work."

"After a cold beer and a nap, maybe." Indifference is also important. Never let them know what you really want.

His escort is dismissed. He can move about the common areas of the base as he pleases.

General Hux has taken to calling him a concubine. Boba has taken to stealing commlinks and mixing up the signals. When Hux says something disparaging about the supreme leader, Boba makes sure Kylo hears it.

Watching Kylo slam Hux repeatedly into the wall is moderately satisfying. What happens afterwards, less so.

"Is something wrong?"

"I'm old," Boba tells him with a shrug. "Just because I don't look it doesn't mean I'm not."

"Is there something else I could do? Something you would enjoy?"

He cups Kylo's cheek, traces his scar with his thumb. "There's only one thing I need."

When Kylo makes his decision, it comes with gifts. New ship. New armor. A not-inconsiderable amount of credits. It's almost enough to make him feel young again.

"I'll be in touch," Kylo says stiffly, putting on a front for the troopers in the hanger bay. "Once I have your first target."

"I look forward to it."

At the first spaceport, he disables the tracker and installs a randomizer on the locator signal. At the second spaceport, he sells the ship and purchases an older, more nondescript one. The armor goes out the airlock.

He puts together a datafile of everything he learned, including everything he overheard on his pilfered commlinks. It could be worth quite a bit to the Resistance. But how much?

Finally he points his new ship towards the outer rim, and draws in a slow, deep breath. Time to get back to work. The galaxy is different, but the galaxy is also still the same.


	19. Jaina Solo

Boba Fett is not an easy person to get close to. So when Jaina sees him smile for the first time, and swipe good-naturally at Goran Beviin's arm, she feels an unexpected stab of something that strangely resembles jealousy.

 _Where the kriff did that come from_?

Goran is his adviser and probably his closest friend. Fett is more relaxed around him and his husband Medrit than he is around anyone, even his graddaughter Mirta. Sure he's been training Jaina, day in and day out, until they're both too tired and sore to say a word, but that doesn't make them close.

But he gives her a single nod of approval and her pulse skips a beat.

It's a crush. A stupid, illogical crush. The bounty hunter is even older than her dad, worn and scarred and not in the least bit interested in her. It's a distraction. A way for her mind to cope with what she's here to do, and what she'll have to face when her training is complete.

Her brother.

No. Darth Caedus.

So she doesn't fight it. When she's too restless to sleep, she lets herself imagine what might happen if she climbed into Fett's bed. She thinks about his mouth on her skin, and his fingers in her hair. He's ridiculously well-endowed in her fantasies, because why not, and has no trouble getting hard because age doesn't exist when she's that close to climaxing.

In the evenings she stays by the open hearth as long as he does, long after their hosts have retired to bed. She soaks up his quiet, comfortable presence as he watches the flames die down into embers.

His leg is bothering him today. She sees him shift in his seat and stretch it out towards the fading heat. "Goran showed me where the medkit is. I can get you a shot."

"I'm fine. It's just stiff."

It's not just stiff. She can sense his pain. "Would it hurt you to ask for help once in a while?"

He gives her dry look. "Maybe."

"As much as that?"

He exhales, and resumes staring at the dying fire. "I don't like needles," he says abruptly. "I've had enough of them."

The rare, personal admission makes her brave. "I can help you. Without needles." She's always been a better fighter than a healer, but she knows a few rudimentary tricks.

He looks at her for a moment. "Sure," he says finally, shifting in his chair again.

"I'll have to touch you."

He gives permission with the tilt of his head, and Jaina has to suppress the surge of heat in her belly. This is not one of her fantasies. He's asking for her help. She kneels on the floor beside his outstretched leg and lays one hand on his shin and the other on this thigh.

 _Well, kriff, I'm wet._

It's a good thing this requires concentration. After a minute or two, she can feel the bright edges of pain dull, and then slowly dissolve. She looks up at him with her hands still in place. "You're working too hard."

"You're not ready." He looks down at her, and his mouth flattens into a sober line. "You haven't accepted what you have to do. I push you to keep you focused. So you don't break when it finally settles in."

She rubs his leg a little with the flat of her palm. "And what if it breaks you first?"

That earns her a low growl. "Don't worry about me. If I can't stand up, Goran will take over."

There's a tenuous intimacy in this moment. If she makes a move now, it won't be a fantasy any longer. It could be something much more precarious. It could be real. "We could always try something else," she says, her mouth dry. "For example, sex has been known to improve focus."

She's ready to laugh it off at the first sign of resistance, but Fett's eyes drop to her hand, still resting on his thigh. Jaina can feel the tension of his body against her palm. "I thought maybe you and Mirta-" He lets the sentence hang.

"Mirta seems to like men. Exclusively."

" _Fek_." He seems genuinely disappointed by that. "I don't want some jumped-up little Mando prick keeping her at home. She's too good for that."

"So if I'm good enough for your granddaughter-"

"It's not a matter of being good enough." He straightens, and her hand falls off his leg. "It's a question of whether or not it would help your training."

"I think it would."

His eyes are intent on her face, his expression thoughtful. "It's not happening tonight. I'll think about it."

Jaina is more than willing to accept that. "Then I guess I'll turn in." As she stands, Fett's eyes return to the hearth. Only a few glowing embers remain. He sees her standing there watching him, and his head jerks in the direction of her room.

"Bed. Go."

"Say that to me again," she requests. "If you decide to go through with it. Say it exactly like that."

He looks up at her with a mixture of exasperation and amusement. "Go to _sleep_ , Jaina. Tomorrow will be a full day of training. You'll need your rest."


	20. Greedo

"D'ja hear?"

Greedo looked up into the greasy human face of J'tho Umbar, a pirate turned bounty hunter who was, unfortunately, his bunk-mate for the night. "Hear what?"

"Fett got the Vargul trader. Alive."

"How?"

" _Fek_ if I know. He won't be down here tonight, that's for sure. Jabba put him in one of the nice rooms. As a reward."

Accommodations at Jabba's palace had three distinct tiers. There were the nice rooms, reserved for important guests and beings that Jabba wished to impress. Then there were the hovels, the old monastery cells where bounty hunters and smugglers and courtiers could rent an overpriced bed. The final tier was the floor of the throne room. It was free, if you didn't mind Gamorreans stepping on you.

"I was the one who told him to watch the pit matches," Greedo grumbled. "But do I get a word of thanks? No."

J'tho laughed. "You've been around here long enough to know better. Never help another hunter, especially Boba Fett."

"He's not so bad," Greedo protested. "He's always been polite to me. Professional."

"He's an upstart clone freak. Feels like yesterday he was just some snot-nose kid running after Jango. Hey, shove over, would ya?" J'tho made some repulsive human noises while he settled in beside Greedo on the narrow bunk, a precursor to the snoring that was sure to come.

The door to their room opened abruptly, and they both went for their guns. The dim yellow light glinted off Boba Fett's helmet. J'tho made a choking noise, and Greedo could smell his sudden sweat.

"Greedo," Fett said. "Come with me."

He thought about asking why, but the bounty hunter was already gone. It seemed if he wanted to know, he would have to follow him. J'tho shrank back to let him off the bunk, blinking rapidly.

He realized quickly that Fett was heading for his room. "Look at this," he said as he opened the door. "Have you ever seen anything this ridiculous on a desert planet?"

The sound of running water reached him before he even stepped through the door. It was a fountain of sorts, water flowed from the mouth of some kind of winged beast into a pool about a meter wide and nearly as deep.

Such pools were commonplace on Rodia in homes and in public spheres, but he certainly never expected to see anything like it on Tatooine, where water was so hard to come by. Greedo couldn't remember the last time he was wet all over, and the sound of the water nearly made him light-headed.

The rest of the room was more or less what he expected. The bed looked comfortable and there was a fully stocked bar.

"You want a drink?" Fett asked. "Help yourself."

"I can't drink most alcohols. The fermentation process doesn't agree with Rodians."

"And I don't drink," he said as he removed his helmet. "So that's wasted on us."

"Us?" Greedo was very confused. Fett had stopped near the edge of the pool and was starting to remove his armor.

"You did me a favor," he said. "It was your idea to track the pit matches. You could have done it yourself."

"Ah…I'm tied up with the Levotorn raiders right now."

"But you didn't have to help me." Fett gave him a sharp look as he continued to strip down. "None of the others would have."

Greedo averted his eyes, knowing that humans could be somewhat shy about their naked bodies. Men in particular, since their genitalia was always on the outside.

"Are you going to join me?" There was a splashing noise, and his skin itched with desire. All that water…

Fett was submerged up to his chest, sitting on a low bench in the pool with his arms outstretched along the edge. There was plenty of room for another being in the pool. Greedo quickly removed his own clothing, and before long he was sitting in the pool, soaking in the blessed moisture.

"This is…good of you, Fett."

He shrugged, and tilted his head to one side. "I like you. You're not stupid, but you know your limits and you stick to them. Also I like your eyes. They remind me of home."

The compliment caught him off guard, even as he tried to figure out the other bounty hunter's intentions. "J'tho says I would do better to be more ambitious. But…I've been mixed up in bigger deals before. It's not worth it."

Fett snorted. "J'tho will be lucky to survive the year. You're smart. Stick to what you know will be profitable. Pirates. Thieves. Smugglers skimming their cargo."

"That's good advice. And yet," Greedo offered warily, "that would leave the higher bounty jobs for you."

"The higher the bounty, the higher the risk."

"Hmmm." Greedo settled further into the water. His eyes shifted over to Fett, who gave him a smirk. He thought about the bed the bounty hunter was offering to share with him. At least he smelled better than J'tho. "Do you snore?"

"No one's ever told me that I do."

"Good." Greedo relaxed against the edge of the pool and let his eyes close.


	21. Han Solo

When Boba awoke, he became aware of two things simultaneously. One was that he had a very unwelcome throbbing headache. The other was that a man was was pressing wet, sloppy kisses down his stomach, which brought to his attention another unwelcome physical state.

"Looks like somebody's awake," Han Solo greeted him a rough morning rasp, his breath hot on his naked hip.

Boba shoved him off and rolled out of bed, reaching for the blaster that was always within arm's reach- _where was his fekking blaster_.

"Easy," Solo complained. "We said no rough stuff, remember? First date, and all that."

"First _what_."

"It's an expression. What…are you looking for your gun?" Solo ran a hand through his tousled hair and grinned at him. "Boy, you really don't remember anything from last night, do you?"

"Where is it?"

"Wait." His expression transformed into one of concern. "You _really_ don't remember?"

Boba didn't bother to answer. He grabbed the sheet dangling off the bed and wrapped it around Solo's neck. The smuggler's self-defense instinct was just a second too late, and in spite of his struggles, Boba pinned him to the bed and yanked the sheet tight around his throat. "Where. Is. It."

"Room. Safe. _Kriff_ , Fett-"

He dropped the sheet and crossed the room, only to be met with a biometric lockpad that required two hand scans. "Hey." Solo was breathing hard, but he was right beside him in a second, his hand on Boba's shoulder. "Look, I am _sorry_. I knew you were wasted, but I didn't know you were _that_ wasted. I wouldn't have-"

Boba shrugged off his hand, grabbed his wrist and forced the smuggler's palm onto the scan pad beside his own. The safe beeped once and opened. His blasters. His armor. It was all there. Stacked on top of Solo's gunbelt.

" _Ow_ ," the other man protested, pulling his hand back.

It was coming back to him now, in bits and pieces. Solo laughing, letting his belt slide down his hips in a parody of a strip tease. The softness of his hair between Boba's fingers and the sweaty tangle of their bodies between the sheets.

Even in bed, the smuggler never stopped talking. "Now say it back to me," he coaxed. "Say it in that sexy-as-hell voice of yours."

Humiliation tasted like bile, which in turn tasted like that green candy-sweet drink. Maybe the bartender's Basic wasn't the best, but how could "I don't drink alcohol" be any clearer?

"Do I…do I need to apologize for something here?" Solo actually sounded worried, which was fitting. Boba could probably kill him and dump his body in this garbage heap of a spaceport without anyone noticing.

But the smuggler hadn't really done anything wrong. He was his usual irritating self, suggesting that Boba owed him a drink for distracting those officers at the docking bay, even though his "distraction" was an accident due to the extremely poor condition of his ship.

Solo was like a rancor cub with a bone, and to avoid hearing about it every time they ran into one another Jabba's, Boba bought two drinks and sat down across from him with the intention of glaring at him for exactly as long as it took to drain his glass and then walking away.

"I don't drink alcohol," he said aloud, trying to reassure himself that he had, in fact, said it.

"That would explain it." Solo retreated to the bed and pulled a sheet over his lap. "There's probably half a bottle in those felspire cocktails. But you know what's weird? Mine didn't have any alcohol in it at all."

Boba let his aching head fall forward until it touched the wall above the safe. There was no _karking_ way he was ever going to tell Solo what happened. "Where are my clothes?"

"'Fresher. Remember the shower?"

Well, _now_ he did.

"Sure you want to rush off?" Solo leaned back on his arms and smirked at him. "Seems like you and your dick are having a difference of opinion."

Boba stalked off into the 'fresher without a word.


	22. Queen Apailana

_Queen Apailana was the elected queen on Naboo during the rise of the Empire. In Legends canon she dies about a year after ROTS, at the age of 13-14, while hiding Jedi on Naboo. I didn't feeling like writing an angsty teen romance, so this assumes she's still alive and ruling 5-6 years after the Emperor seizes control._

* * *

"Are we alone?"

The woman in the red cloak stayed where she was, in the shadow of the garden alcove. "We are."

Boba turned on infrared in his helmet and scanned the moonlit grounds of the villa. It appeared that she was telling the truth, but appearances could be deceiving, and the Naboo were notoriously skilled at illusions. "How do I know it's you, and not one of your handmaids?"

She stepped from the shadows and lowered her hood. Queen Apailana gazed placidly back at him, her face devoid of her usual ceremonial makeup.

"I'm surprised they let you come alone."

"I told them I had a Mandalorian lover with an affinity for outdoor love-making and so required privacy for our tryst." She dropped her eyes as the corners of her mouth curled up. "If you would be so kind, please try to affect the walk of someone who has been highly engaged in passionate activity when you leave. It would greatly aid my deception."

"I'll try."

"At this point, I do not know who I can trust." When she looked back up at him, her expression was sober, her large, dark eyes full of sorrow.

Boba had to remind himself that he was not here to be sucked into royal intrigue by a pretty face. "Did you bring the payment we agreed on?"

"I did." She held out her hand, and the moonlight glinted off the credit chit in it. "Information first. Then payment."

"You were correct. Padmé Amidala did not die on Coruscant."

"So Palpatine lied."

Only the Naboo still called him Palpatine. On other systems he was the Emperor, his family name and homeworld all but erased. "It appears so. She died on Polis Massa, in a med center."

"Polis Massa?"

"The records were all purged. I had to take the information out of the med droids…and a few of the sentient staff."

"But you avoided any fatalities?"

"Of course. You paid extra for that."

She left the alcove and stepped onto the vibrant green grass. The blades were so tender their green juices left a sheen in every footstep. She reached out her hand to a bush studded with white flowers that shrank back as her hand passed over them. "Ghost blossoms," she said. "Have you seen them before?"

"I don't spend a lot of time looking at flowers."

"These are not just flowers. Our ancestors learned stealth detection from them. To fight the enemy they could not see." Her hand drew back. "Tell me, Bounty Hunter. Were you able to learn the identity of Padmé's murderer?"

"You won't like it."

"I asked for the truth," she said, turning to face him. "Palpatine told me she was killed by a Jedi."

"She was."

"And what possible motivation could a Jedi have for killing one of their strongest supporters?"

"He was her lover."

She drew in a sharp breath at that. "That's who she was pregnant by? A Jedi?"

"A jealous one." Boba watched her face as she took it in. "Don't be surprised that a Jedi was willing to break the rules of their order. They broke faith with the Republic easily enough."

Apailana pressed her lips together. There were many on Naboo who didn't believe in the Jedi uprising. It seemed their queen was one of them. "So he killed her, and their unborn children. His name?"

"Anakin Skywalker." There was one other piece of information he'd discovered that he had already decided not to share. Padmé Amidala had given birth to two live infants before she died. There was no record of what happened to the babies, but it was not uncommon for med centers to arrange off-the-books adoptions. Wherever the children ended up, Boba was certain they were better off far away from all of this.

"I met General Skywalker once," the queen recalled. "He is dead now, is he not?"

"It's said he died on Mustafar. Unconfirmed."

She gave him a sharp look. "So he still could be out there? In hiding?"

"It's possible. There are worlds that have become havens for Jedi on the run."

Apailana didn't take her eyes off of him. "If he is still alive…" she said slowly. "I would like very much to know where he is. Perhaps you could keep that in mind." She held out his payment, and Boba took it from her hand.

"As you wish, Your Highness." He dropped to one knee, not to bow, but to gather up a handful of tender grass blades and smear them down the front of his chestplate and knees.

The queen watched him as he stood, her thin eyebrows arched. "Is that what we've been doing?" She dropped her cloak to the grass and sat down on it, her legs spread beneath her long skirt.

Boba held out his hand to help her rise and she gathered her cloak from the ground. The imprint in the grass seemed to her satisfaction. "You have our gratitude, Bounty Hunter."

"I don't work for gratitude. If you need my services again, you know how to contact me."

She lifted a graceful hand, wet with grass juices and touched the side of his helmet. "I won't forget it."


	23. Thrawn

It was an accident, the first time he noticed it. The bounty hunter had just picked up his payment for a rebel transmitter, and Thrawn was gazing absently out over the lower command level from the observation deck. He wasn't really paying attention to the armored man until he stopped in front of the art installation embedded into the wall.

It was pedestrian, really. A mass-produced copy of a better work from a different era, a simple rippling light effect on a field of gray. But the bounty hunter stopped in front of it, standing much closer than people usually did. As if he might step through it at any moment.

His curiosity piqued, Thrawn checked the docking bay logs to find his name. Boba Fett. A regular contractor for the detention block, as well as Lord Vader himself.

The next time his ship docked, Thrawn decided to watch for him. Would he stop to look at the piece again, or had it been a one-time impulse?

He stopped. He remained there for almost a full standard minute.

After he left, Thrawn went down to the command level and stood exactly where the bounty hunter had. It was too close, really. The entire scheme became a blur around him, like a rough sea. But Fett chose to stand here for a reason. Why? What did he see?

The third time, he was ready. He busied himself with a data pad until he caught a glimpse of combat armor. This time, he was right there when the bounty hunter stopped to look.

And apparently he was not subtle enough to escape Fett's notice.

"Admiral."

Thrawn slowly approached the man. "You like to look at this, don't you?"

"It's made to be looked at."

"And yet, no one does. Except for you." A bounty hunter. A ruffian in old Mandalorian armor. He wore a jet pack, for the gods sake.

"I'm sure you have more important things to do than question me about my taste in art." He turned to go.

"Wait."

He stopped, but the tension in his shoulders clearly made it a matter of caution rather than desire. It was never wise to anger an Imperial officer in his own command post.

"I wish to know something before you go."

He waited, his back still to Thrawn.

"Turn around," he said, more impatiently than he intended. "Face me."

The bounty hunter slowly complied.

"Why do you like it?"

"I never said I liked it."

He was really quite irritating. Thrawn found himself wondering what was under that helmet. What sort of colors and textures would he find, if he broke Fett out of his shell? "Why does it interest you?" He demanded. "Why do you stop?"

The silence stretched on. So long that there could only be one possible answer. "You don't know, do you?"

Fett tilted his head to one side. "Not everything has a reason, Admiral."

"Art does." Thrawn tucked his datapad under his arm. "I'm sorry to delay you. But I'm afraid you're going to have to stay for dinner."

"Dinner?"

"As my honored guest. I will explain to you all of the reasons why someone might have made that mediocre piece and then you will do me the courtesy of trying to explain why it intrigues you."

"I'm not hungry."

"You will be. I have an excellent chef. I can even arrange for dinner attire if you would care to change."

"No. Thank you." The words were clipped. Angry, but also resigned. He would have to take his helmet off to eat. Thrawn was very much looking forward to it.

"Very well. Come with me."


	24. Hera Syndulla

"Perimeter sensors in range."

"I see them." Hera drew in a slow, deep breath and disengaged the ship's thrusters. The bounty hunter was as still as a stone in the co-pilot's seat and the cockpit was very, very quiet.

Now she needed to correct course without acceleration to catch the tractor beam. If she was off even a degree or two, the ship would trip the sensors and activate the perimeter alarm.

Her hand on the directional stick was steady. The _Ghost_ drifted into the low-flow debris stream and she winced in sympathy as her ship lurched and caught.

The long, slow journey beneath the supply station was underway. She exhaled in relief. "Time to the anchor spot, two standard hours."

Boba Fett relaxed visibly and leaned back in the chair with his legs stretched out. "Always a pleasure to watch you work, Syndulla."

She couldn't tell if he was being sarcastic or not. His helmet gave nothing away. A proximity alarm went off as a bit of space debris floated by them, and she she reached down to shut it off, squirming a little in her seat to reach it.

"Need any help?"

It was the only acknowledgement he'd given to the swollen belly. Hera gave him a quick look as she made a few more adjustments to the navigation. "I'm fine."

She didn't like dealing with mercenaries, but in this particular case, their interests were uniquely aligned. An Imperial commander had gone rogue on a remote supply station, and when his second-in-command reported his bizarre behavior, he'd tortured and killed her in a gruesome fashion before sending the recording to his superiors.

The Empire wanted him removed. Quietly. That was where Fett came in.

What the Empire was not aware of was that one of the station's crew was so horrified by what he'd seen, he'd defected. He'd been feeding Imperial codes and transmissions to the rebellion for days in a desperate plea for help.

That was Hera's part. She could have gotten another rebel to help, but Fett had the entry codes to the commander's private quarters, which her defector did not. She watched out of the corner of her eye as the bounty hunter examined her ship's console and ran a gloved finger across the edge of the aft control panel. "What the compression capacity in this thing? Seventy?"

"Eighty-seven point two."

He gave a soft grunt and leaned closer to the panel. "Forced injectors?"

"Of course." The cockpit was stuffy without the air circulators and she could feel her body temperature rising. She removed her coat and opened the top of her shirt, moving restlessly in her seat. _Kriff_ , her hormones were acting up again.

"How about letting me sit in that chair on the return flight?" Fett offered casually, as if he was doing her a favor. "It would give you chance to rest."

"Never in million years."

"Afraid you might learn something new?"

"From you?" Hera gave him a bemused look. "You'll have to do better than that."

His helmet tilted to one side. "I'll give you a thousand credits."

She smirked at him. "Ha. Still no."

He leaned towards her. The way the light bounced off the visor of his helmet reminded her of Sabine. Same basic style, but Fett lacked her friend's artistic flair. "Maybe there's something you need," he suggested. "Or someone."

"Control yourself, Fett."

He settled back in his chair. "You're leaking."

Her eyes flew to the console first before she realized what he was referring to. "Sithspit!" Two wet patches were spreading on her shirt. "Not yet," she berated her body as she reached for a clean rag beneath the co-pilot's seat. She couldn't reach it. "Could you-"

He handed her the cloth without comment.

" _Kriff_. Don't get pregnant," she grumbled as she stuffed the rag down the front of her shirt. "One second you're hot and the next you're cold. You go from being sad to angry to horny every other minute and there's no way to stand up, sit or lie down that's comfortable."

"That sounds inconvenient."

She was beginning to pick up on his tone now. It wasn't sarcastic, just dry. "People tell me it'll be worth it. Once he's born."

"He?"

"I had the scan done. He doesn't look much like me."

"Takes after his dad?"

"I guess so." Something about her face or tone must have warned him from pursuing that topic any further. They fell into silence for a few minutes.

"What will you do with him, once he's born? Take him with you?"

"What choice do I have?" She couldn't quite temper the edge of defenseness in her voice, but Fett gave a nod of approval.

"He'll like it. I used to go everywhere with my dad."

"You did?"

"Best days of my life." The bounty hunter leaned back against the seat again. "What's the weapon systems charging rate for this ship?"

"I don't think we know each other well enough for that." She laid back against her own seat and raised an eyebrow at him. "I'll let you talk dirty to me though, if you want to tell me about _your_ ship."


	25. Han Solo AND Lando Calrissian

Getting into the security monitoring center on Cloud City was easy. The staff took one look at his armor and his blasters and decided to take an early lunch.

Vader was busy setting up his little ambush, but Boba preferred to be here. Watching. Lando put on a good show for the Imperials, but he and Han Solo went way back. Someone had to keep an eye on him.

He tracked their progress through the corridors as Lando played tour guide, catching bits and pieces of their conversation. The audio receptors were a little spotty, but their body language said enough. The princess was wary, the Wookiee was impatient, and Han was clearly relieved to find a safe harbor.

"Listen to you," He said to Lando at one point. "You sound like a businessman, a responsible leader. Who'd have thought that, huh?" Lando smiled, but to Boba's eyes the expression looked a little strained.

"You know, seeing you sure brings back a few things."

They moved on, out of the receptors range. The protocol droid was lagging behind, but Boba wanted to stay on Lando, so he switched feeds as the group stopped at an observation deck overlooking the manufacturing level. The princess seemed interested.

"There's a couple of hover pods there if you want to see the full layout," Lando offered. He put his hand on Han's shoulder, indicating without words that he should stay behind.

"Yeah, go with her," Han told his Wookiee first mate. "Give us a chance to catch up."

Chewbacca gave a soft growl and followed her. Once the hover pods had left, Lando pulled Han over to the wall.

Boba straightened a little, watching the two men closely. If Lando was trying to hide, he was doing a terrible job of it. Both the visual and audio receptors were crystalline clear.

"Everything okay?" Han asked. There was tension in his shoulders.

"Everything's fine," Lando reassured him. "I just wanted to make sure _you_ were okay."

"Me?"

"It has to be a little weird. Fett trying to track you down…"

Han made a dismissive gesture. "I'm sure it's just business as usual for him. Running errands for Jabba."

"You don't think there might be some…hard feelings?"

"He doesn't have feelings."

"We both know that's not true."

Han shook his head. "You're not still hung up on him-"

"This isn't about me." There was a clear note of frustration in Lando's voice. "Believe me, there are days I regret ever getting in the middle of your little love/hate thing, and today is _definitely_ one of those days…but Boba isn't the kind who forgives and forgets."

"I know _that_." Han shifted his weight from one foot to the other. "Have you talked to him? Recently?"

As always, Lando had a deft response. "I don't have time to talk. When was the last time _we_ talked?"

"Our relationship was never really about talking." Han gave him a crooked grin as he leaned one shoulder against the wall. "Remember that night at Jabba's? The three of us?"

"Don't…don't go there."

"C'mon. That was hot as hell. You always had the magic touch with him. He'd do stuff for you that he wouldn't do for me."

"I don't want to talk about that right now."

"We had a good time. It's a shame it ended the way it did."

"He wanted to be with you," Lando returned, softly and grimly. "And you hurt his feelings."

Han's gaze dropped to his feet. "Yeah, you're probably right. I could have handled it better."

"You should tell him that."

The smuggler snorted out a laugh. "Like he'd give me a chance before he stuns my ass and takes me to Jabba."

Lando put a hand on his shoulder again. "There are ways," he said, and for a moment Boba thought he almost looked in the direction of the security recorder. But the princess and the Wookiee were docking their hover pods and the group moved on.

Boba's eyes narrowed behind his helmet. Wait. Where was the droid? He switched feeds again, cycling back through the corridor. Oh. _That_ could be problem.


	26. Aurra Sing

"Well, here we are," she said as she dropped into her seat. Her voice was the just same as he remembered. Low and raspy. Cool with a bite. Aurra wrapped a long-fingered hand around the neck of the bottle and dragged it across the table. She filled two cups and pushed one at Boba.

"The last time we had a drink together you took it from me."

"You were just a kid then." Her eyes raked over him with a boldness that seemed designed to make him squirm. Boba wasn't about to give her that satisfaction. "And now you're all grown up," she mused. "You sure do look like Jango…no surprise there, I guess."

"It would be kind of weird if I didn't."

Her thin lips curled into a smirk. "So…you and I have a conflict."

"My client wants your client dead."

"And my client wants _your_ client dead." She lifted the cup to her lips and took a drink. "What a shame we can't get paid in advance."

Boba picked up his own cup, but he didn't drink. Not yet. "Jabba doesn't want a war over this."

"I'll bet he doesn't." She set her cup down. "Fifteen seconds. Is that what you're waiting for?"

He checked the time for himself, gave it an extra two seconds, and then took a sip.

"I taught you that," she recalled, drumming her fingers on the table beside her cup. "Most poisons take fifteen seconds to manifest. But I don't want you dead, Boba. I want us to work together, just like the old days."

"What did you have in mind?"

"We compare price tags. The highest offer completes the job, and gives the other a cut. We both get something and no one has to die."

"Except one of our clients."

"Let's be honest. Who would miss either of them?" She tipped her head back and took a long drink. He could see her slender throat convulse as she swallowed. "So what's he offering you?"

"Nine thousand."

"Nine?" She stared at him in silence for a moment. "Did I fail to teach you how to negotiate?"

"You failed me in a lot of ways," Boba settled back in his seat as far as his jetpack would allow and took another sip from his cup.

"You're not still sore about that, are you?" She leaned forward, with one slender arm braced against the table. "You know why I left you? You were becoming too dependent on me, and that's not how this business works." She reached for the bottle and refilled her glass. "You can't trust anybody and you can't rely on anyone but yourself."

"Lesson learned." Boba set down his cup. "So how much is your client offering _you_?"

"Twelve. I'll finish the job and you'll get four for doing nothing. Easiest credits you've ever made."

"Six sounds better to me."

"Oh, _now_ you're negotiating? Six and I'll buy you a good dinner in the city." Her mouth curved into a slow smile that was both challenging and seductive. "Your dad always was the only human I could stand. Maybe you've got the same quality."

Boba held her eyes. "Maybe it's time you stopped talked about my dad."

"All right." She tilted her head to one side. "You're your own man now, Boba. What's it going to be?"

He lifted his arm and engaged his commlink. "Is it done?"

Krrsantan gave a snarl in response. Aurra's face changed dramatically when she heard the Wookiee's response. "He's _dead_? Why you little-" She slammed her cup down on the table, but Boba didn't even flinch. "You teamed up with that _beast_?"

"Good thing your client wasn't actually offering you twelve." He picked up his helmet and stood. "You were right. You can't trust anybody. But you can sometimes rely on other hunters when they have a score to settle."

Aurra stood and pulled her blaster in one sweeping motion, but Boba was just as quick. They stood there for alost a full minute, blasters drawn, staring one another down.

"It's over," Boba told her in a flat voice. "No one _else_ has to die."

She took a step back towards the door without lowering her gun. "I hate to run," she rasped. "Let's just say you owe me dinner."

The way she was looking at him was very different now. And very satisfying. "It's a date."


	27. Bossk

"What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing," Bossk hissed.

Boba's eyes narrowed behind his his helmet's visor. He'd known the Trandoshan bounty hunter a long time, well over a decade now, and he knew something was wrong. He was restless, shifting his weight from side to side, clenching and unclenching his thick, scaly hands. That was unusual. His species didn't need to move around the way humans did during long periods of inactivity, a trait that Boba sometimes envied.

Also, there was a smell. A certain musky odor that seemed to be clinging to him. It could have been the room, this tattered little rental with a lumpy bed and mildewed walls, conveniently across the street from their quarry's favorite casino. But it wasn't.

"He's not coming out," Bossk said, raising the bi-scope to his eyes. "He's s-staying the night. Probably with that dancer." He lowered the scope quickly and hunched a little as if reacting to a sudden pain.

"Are you injured?"

" _No_."

Boba didn't like playing the question and answer game. "I don't need any surprises on this job. He's not going to go down without a fight, and if you can't fight-"

"I can fight," Bossk interrupted. "I want a fight. All this s-s-sitting around. I don't like it. Maybe we could…we could lure him out."

The hiss the Trandoshan usually tried to suppress was becoming pronounced, a sign that he was angry or upset. And the smell was getting stronger. The air was ripe with it. "Enough," Boba growled. "Tell me what this is, or I'll find someone else."

The Trandoshan's orange eyes gleamed at him in the dim light of the little room. "I'm…in my green phase. It's…like a…heat?"

It took Boba a few seconds to get it. "A mating heat?"

"Yesss." His eyes seemed to glow even brighter. "Bad timing for this job."

"You don't have shots you can take?"

Bossk turned back to the window. "They make me s-s-sleepy. Can't do much." His head lowered, and his voice turned gruff. "I can still work like thisss. I won't let you down."

"I know you won't." Boba folded his arms over his chest. "I'm not some ignorant hick, Bossk. I've been around non-humans my entire life. How do you usually handle the green phase without shots?"

"S-s-some drinks can help. Stimulants. The best way is to rut it out, but that requires a mate."

"Another Trandoshan?"

"Any species, if they're s-s-strong enough.."

Boba moved over to the other window and looked out at the casino. Bossk was probably right about their target. He wouldn't emerge until morning. "How long does it usually last?"

"A day or two."

" _Fierfek_."

"Like I s-s-said, I can still work. Wish I had something to do. Take my mind off of it." His teeth ground together in frustration.

Looking at his massive reptilian mouth, Boba had a thought. "Trandoshans…they don't give blowjobs, do they?"

"Not the s-s-same way." Bossk extended his long tongue, gleaming with thick saliva. Boba found himself staring at it, intrigued and little aroused, before he remembered the row of jagged teeth just behind it. Yeah, maybe not.

"What about getting blowjobs? You ever had one from a human?"

"Yesss," the brightness of his eyes suggested it was a happy memory. "There was a man on Nar Shaddaa once. He was small, but fierce. Like you."

"I'm not small," Boba protested immediately.

"You're a human. You're all small and weak."

" _Kark_ you. I was going to offer to help, but I don't suck off xenophobes."

"You were…" Bossk stared at him for a moment, then let out a rough guffaw. "You barely open your mouth to talk…I don't think you could-"

"You think I haven't been with a non-human before?" The fact that the breadth of his experience was _one_ non-human didn't seem relevant. Bossk was treating him like a child, a dynamic he thought they'd outgrown.

"Pleasuring a Trandoshan is not the same as pleasuring some spice-addled Twi'lek."

"It wasn't a…you know what? Forget it. Forget I said anything."

"I wasn't trying to insult you, Fett." Bossk shifted a little, and made a huffing noise that might have been a sigh. "It was generousss of you offer. I know you don't like…to get personal."

"It's your loss," Boba replied coldly.

"Jus-s-st as well. Look."

His attention went back to the casino. Their target was leaving. "Let's go."

Bossk reached for his gun and huffed in relief. "Time for a fight."


	28. Shon-Ju

_I'll save some people a trip to Wookieepedia by telling you in advance that Shon-Ju is a character from a Clone Wars era comic called The Deadly Hands of Shon-Ju. He was a Jedi padawan who left the temple at Count Dooku's urging and formed his own splinter group._

* * *

"Mind if I sit down?"

Boba looked at the man's face first, and then at the cybernetic hand grasping the chair back. His tone was friendly but those eyes weren't playing games. Maybe he was looking for a mercenary. "Suit yourself."

"Nice armor. Mandalorian?"

"The armor is."

As he sat down Boba noticed that both of the man's hands were cybernetic, and he wore no gloves or sheathing to make them look more natural. Interesting.

A chime sounded as a shuttle arrived at the terminal. "Is that yours?" The man inquired.

"No."

His eyes flickered to the list of incoming shuttles. "Headed to the spaceport?"

"What do you want?" Boba was never one for small talk.

"I could help but notice the Ithorian that was sitting here…and his very loud conversation with his traveling companion."

"What about it?"

"He was advocating for a new Jedi order, a remarkably treasonous statement to make at such a high volume."

Boba looked the man over again. If he was imperial agent, he was good at concealing it. His posture was slack, and his long black hair was untidily pulled back. There were a few strands of white mixed in with the jet strands, but his face put his age at no more than mid-forties.

"I was listening to him…I couldn't really do otherwise, but I was more interested in your reaction."

It seemed like a strange comment to make to a man who's face was concealed by a helmet. Was it a joke? A pass?

"I could feel your…disgust."

A warning shiver crept up the back of of Boba's neck. "You could _feel_ it."

"Yes. I trained to be a Jedi when I was young, but the council never granted me the status of a knight. We had some…disagreements." The stranger leaned forward, his arms on his knees, and peered at Boba through wayward strands of black hair. "You feel the way I _used_ to feel. Angry and helpless."

"What changed?"

"I found an outlet for my outrage. I started my own order, a place of refuge for those who rejected the old ways."

"Former Jedi?"

"Some, yes. Others were never identified, or they came of age after the purge. And there are some like you. Not force-sensitive, but they have personal experience with the flaws of the Jedi order."

Boba wondered how many of those refugees were on Vader's list. How many of them had prices on their heads?

"I can feel your interest," the stranger said with a smile. "What's holding you back?"

"I don't know if I should trust you." Boba opted for honesty. "One force-user is the same as another to me."

The man didn't blink. His eyes remained fixed on Boba's visor, but one cybernetic hand moved to touch his gloved one. "Give me a chance to prove you wrong."

The chime sounded again, announcing the arrival of the next shuttle. Boba decided his departure could wait. "I go by 'Lucky,'" he told the stranger. "What should I call you?"

"Shon-Ju." There was a spark of something devious in his eyes, something that warned Boba to proceed with caution. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Lucky. Would you care to join me for dinner?"

"Yeah. I think I would."


	29. Bo-Katan Kryze

She didn't know who he was. That was careless of her, but it happened so quickly, helmets on, fumbling around armor. Boba Fett. It's a name that's becoming increasingly synonymous with ruthlessness and success. People say he's the best.

Jango Fett would be so proud. The older, more mercenary version of him, anyway. She wonders sometimes what the _Mand'alor_ who labeled himself a "True Mandalorian" and waged war against the Death Watch would think of his creation.

She isn't even sure what _she_ thinks about him.

He knew who she was from the start. Her past. Her family. Her failure as regent. The price on her head doesn't seem to be a temptation.

They met the second time in a shabby hotel behind a spaceport on a world far from Mandalore. He wears an odd assortment of armor and weapons, both Mandalorian and not. " _Dar'manda,"_ she said with a shake of her head.

"What's that mean?"

"Is that really what you want? A language lesson?"

It wasn't what he wanted.

She has a hunch he knows what it means anyway. It's what people like Jango Fett used to call her. What he wants is her scorn. Her curled lip.

One meeting turns into two and then five and then she loses count of the number of times she's pressed her boot down on his bare chest and watched him shudder in response.

There's a hunger in him. She knows it too well.

"It's not a good idea," she tells him, "working for a Sith." Her head is resting on his chest, and he stirs beneath her.

"Vader's not so bad." His voice is rough, as if she woke him.

"You're arrogant. It's going to bite you in the _shebs_ one of these days."

A man alone in the galaxy is a man with nothing to lose. A man who will risk too much. His tongue cuts a shining path across the top of her boot and she only wants to save him.

But she can't.

So she takes him apart with words. Reduces him to his rawest need. "Good boy," she says, raking her nails up the back of his neck.

They're both doomed anyway.


	30. The Sarlacc

It's happening again. The same dream.

He's back in the pit of Carkoon, half-submerged beneath the earth, caught in a warm and shuddering prison.

Jabba wasn't exactly right about what the Sarlacc does. No surprise there. Maybe it has a belly somewhere, but that's not where it's victims fall.

The dream starts as a memory, with the haze of returning to consciousness, and the screams of the guards who fell in just before he did. One by one their cries muffle and die as the interior tentacles, newer and smaller than the exterior ones, fill their mouths.

It might have hurt, but they probably didn't feel it. The spores produced by the Sarlacc are hallucinogenic. Their reason leaves them early and soon their struggling ceases.

And then it's his turn.

Tentacles pull at his arms and legs, testing his strength, exploring the contours of his armor. He isn't completely sealed off, some of the spores make their way through the fabric of his clothing, but thanks to his helmet his mouth is out of reach.

Not for lack of trying.

It's a feeling that still comes to him out of nowhere. The ticklish, crawling sensation of those tender new tentacles sliding around his body, searching for a point of entry.

In his dreams, they find it.

He's no stranger to nightmares or sexual fantasies, but this dream is somehow both. Maybe it's the attempt of his mind to compartmentalize and control what was truly one of the most terrifying experiences of his life. Or maybe in some elusive, medically undetectable way, the Sarlacc's secretions are still in his blood.

In the dream, it doesn't matter. He's not afraid there, because the Sarlacc can't hurt him. It only wants to be close to him, to love him and to fill him up until he's full. It's silky little tendrils caress his skin unimpeded. His helmet is still on, but it always is in his dreams.

He doesn't need his mouth anyway, not when his fingers are free to stroke the tentacles as they crowd against his naked palm and shiver for his attention.

It only wants to love be loved. None of the others understood that. Boba understands.

When he wakes up it's with a racing heart and sweat-damp sheets. The dream never lasts quite long enough.

Sometimes he presses his head into his pillow and tries to hold onto it, or at least hold off the ruthless self-examination that follows. Why this? What's wrong with him?

He's tried to replace it in his mind. Certainly there's no end to available material on the holonet, but nothing ever feels the same.

Sometimes he reminds himself that it could be worse. He could be reliving his escape. He could be dreaming of quaking earth and flames all around him and the sickening sound of his bones breaking. He could be dreaming of pain and merciless sun.

Boba hates the idea of surrender, but maybe it's the best way forward. Maybe it's the only way.

Maybe one day the dream will let him go.


	31. Happiness

Someone asked me to ship Boba/Happiness, so here's some sugar-sweet fluff.

* * *

"Bo!"

Boba took his finger off the spanner trigger and craned his neck, listening.

"Bo!"

He put down the spanner and slid out from under his ship's compression engine. When he left the hanger he realized the sun was setting. No wonder Sin was calling him back to the house.

His wife was standing on the front porch, and she wasn't alone. "Your dad has a question for you."

Jango waited patiently as he approached, unbothered by the eight-year old clinging to his leg with all her might.

"I want to go, _Ba'buir_."

"Ailyn," Boba put his arm around Sin's shoulders and gave their daughter a look. "You're too big for that."

"You think one child can knock me over?" Jango's tone was both challenging and amused. "I'll handle her the same way I always handled you." He tickled Ailyn's sides until she dropped to the ground laughing.

"I wanna _go_ ," she protested as she stood and dusted herself off. "You _promised_."

"Go where?"

"On a job. Nothing too complex. Nothing that requires too hunters. But…" Jango put a hand on his granddaughter's shoulder. "I did promise I would take her, one of these times."

Boba looked at Sin, who pursed her lips. "Hmm."

" _Please_?" Ailyn looked up them, practically vibrating with anticipation.

"It might be nice," Sin conceded. "To have the house ourselves for a few days." Her elbow dug into Boba's side, and he hid his grin by pressing a kiss into her hair.

"It might."

"YES!" Ailyn pumped the air with her fist. "I'll be so good, _Ba'buir_. I promise."

"I know, _Ad'ika_." Jango ruffled her hair. "We'll leave first thing in the morning, all right?"


	32. Sugi

"Pick her up."

Two stormtroopers grabbed her arms and pulled her to her feet. Sugi gritted her teeth, mindful of the half-dozen or so blasters aimed at her head. The Imperial officer in front of her was stout and red-faced. The kind of man who drank too much and boasted about it.

"So sorry about that, my dear. You're such a busy hunter, going here, going there. It was difficult to get your attention."

Of all the beings in the galaxy, Sugi disliked men who used overly familiar nicknames the most. "You've got it now," she responded coldly. "What do you want?"

"I have a very simple, very lucrative job for you. But it's a highly…confidential matter."

The stormtroopers released her arms, and Sugi folded them tightly over her chest. "Go on."

"It's been noted by our agents that you seem to have some sort of…partnership with Boba Fett."

There was a warning prickle on the back of her neck, but she smiled at the officer as if she found his presumption funny. "And?"

"You have…oh, to put it delicately…a romantic relationship with him?"

"What's it to you?"

"We need something from him."

"So hire him. We might be _kriffing_ , but I'm pretty sure he'd _kriff_ a pile of credits just as hard."

The officer's red face turned even redder, and he stared at her in silence.

Sugi shook her head and sighed. "What do you need?"

"A genetic sample."

Now it was her turn to stare. "You don't have enough clones to take samples from?"

"Our technicians have tried, but Boba Fett is the only unaltered clone. We need a clean map of the genetic original."

"And why does the Empire need that?"

The officer drew himself up a little. "That's nothing for you to concern yourself with, my dear. The important thing is that we will pay you handsomely if you can obtain such a sample."

"Ew."

"It wouldn't need to be…" he was getting really flustered now. "Saliva. Hair. Skin cells. We only need enough to form a template."

"A template." Sugi liked this less and less. "I don't know what you heard about me, but this isn't my kind of job."

The man's mouth flattened into a thin line. "I would ask you to reconsider. I have been authorized to provide you with a substantial payment if you succeed and substantial…consequences if you fail." He took a step closer to her, and Sugi didn't miss the way the troopers tensed beside her. "I met another Zabrak bounty hunter on Duro a few weeks ago. Jas Emari. She's your niece, is she not?"

She was careful not to move. Not to let her voice rise. "She is."

"I think we understand one another." He extended his hand, a datacard between his stubby fingers. "This is how you can reach me, once you have the sample."

Sugi took it. "You'll be hearing from me soon."

No one tried to stop her as she left the base. Once she was out of sight, she ducked into an alley and pulled out her commlink. "Fett," she said when he answered. "I met with him."

"And?"

"That womprat of a man actually thought he could intimidate me." She lowered her voice. "He wouldn't tell me what it was for, but I've got his contact info. What do you say we find out where he lives?"

"Sounds like a fun date." A pause. "You want to meet at your place first?"

"Oh yes." She smiled as she tipped her head back and let her horns rest against the rough wall behind her. There were ups and downs to seeing another bounty hunter, but one of the perks was being with someone who knew how to maximize their time. "Remember we're on a tight schedule. So if you could be naked when I get there, that would really help."

She could almost see the glint of warmth in his eyes, and that little curl at the corner of his mouth. "Copy that," he said. "See you soon."


	33. Phasma

The ordinance came as a surprise. One minute they were standing by the transport on the dusty plains, watching the approaching speeders through a long-range scope, and the next their ship was blasted into smoking wreckage.

As Phasma and her troopers scrambled for cover, she thought of an old saying she'd heard once. "Mandalorians aren't known for stealth. It's one thing to see them coming. It's another thing to _do something_ about it."

What started as an ambush quickly became a massacre. She wasn't about to go easy, though. She fought with every weapon she could lay her hands on until the armored commandos closed in on her and she only had one small blaster pistol left.

It was obvious by now that they wanted her alive. That could work to her advantage.

There was a man to her right, a little shorter, with a little more age in his movements. She wrapped her arm around his neck and angled her blaster under the rim of his helmet. " _Stop_."

The blow came out of _kriffing_ nowhere. Her solar plexis caved in under his elbow and her blaster was knocked aside as he turned in her grasp and struck her throat with an open hand.

She barely had time to draw a strangled breath before she was on her knees, disarmed, her helmet gone, staring down the barrel of a blaster. "You don't…" she wheezed, "…know who…you're messing with."

The old one removed his helmet. He was breathing hard, but his eyes were sharp as they fixed on her face. "Haven't had a fight like that in a long time."

One of Mandos took a step toward him. " _Mand'alor_ -"

He made a dismissive gesture. The way the others circled around him, it was clear that he was in charge here. "What's your name?" He asked Phasma.

"Captain Phasma. Of the First Order."

The _Mand'alor_ cast a look at the bodies of her troopers scattered around them. "We got the second part. You're in Mandalorian space without my permission, Captain."

"I don't need your permission," she replied coldly. "The Concordia agreement was nullified by the Senate."

"Right. The _Senate_." He bared his teeth in the barest semblance of a smile. "They didn't get my permission either."

"And who are _you_?"

"Sorry. Boba Fett. I'm the _Mand'alor_."

"That doesn't mean anything to me."

"It means, Captain, that if I give the word, you'll be shot in the stomach and left to slowly and painfully die while carrion birds pick at your innards."

She didn't doubt him. But she wasn't about to show fear. "Some rebel scum were tracked to your system. If you are found to be hiding traitors this entire planet will burn, no matter what you do to me."

"You're looking for resistance fighters?" He glanced over at one of his men, but his face was inscrutable. "Why didn't you say so?"

"You know where they are?"

"No. But I'm very good at finding people." He extended a gloved hand. "There's a town not far from here. How about a drink?"

Phasma ignored his hand and stood on her own. She was taller than most human men, and she towered over the _Mand'alor_. It didn't seem to bother him. He looked her over from her head to her feet, and smirked up at her.

His nose had clearly been broken before, and there were old scars on one side of his face that looked like acid burns. But he was sort of handsome just the same. And he had the confidence of a man who knew who he was and what he was good at.

"I'll take that drink," she said.

Fett nodded. "This way." He turned and stepped over the body of a trooper without hesitating. And Phasma followed.


	34. Sith Leia

"Lord Vader."

The door closed behind him, and Vader knelt before the Emperor. "What is it, my Master?"

"It is your daughter."

He knew this day would come. Ever since Endor, when Leia stood in the throne room, covered in dirt and blood from the unsuccessful rebel assault. "I will never join you," she told the Emperor, her strength radiating through the Force. "I would rather die."

"I know." The Emperor had smiled at her. "But you will not die, Leia Organa. You will be broken. And then you will join us."

Vader knew all too well how resistant she could be. Her ability to shield herself was what kept his daughter from him for so long. Perhaps Obi-Wan had sensed this in her, long ago.

Luke could never hide from him. It was what led to his demise.

But he still had Leia. His beautiful, intelligent, unshakable daughter. No matter how many rebels he tortured and killed in front of her, she never once cried or showed a hint of weakness. Not even when Mon Mothma begged for death.

Leia was a sealed chamber, her walls impenetrable. She came when he summoned her but sat in silence. She held the lightsaber he gave her but refused to raise it, even in self-defense. When his own saber cut into her shoulder she dropped the weapon and stared defiantly at his mask, daring him to kill her.

Her resistance seemed to amuse the Emperor at first. "Have patience, Lord Vader," he said. Was his patience finally at an end?

"My Master," he said now, trying to feel the Emperor's intentions. "I've been too lenient with her. Allow me to try again."

"No. No more training." His master paused. "She is pregnant."

As shocking as it was, there was something Vader found even more shocking. "You can sense this in her?"

"The med droids are programmed to report to me." The Emperor touched a button on his chair, and projection appeared with her medical records. "She must have suspected. She went to the med center on the maintenance floor to escape notice." He turned his attention back to Vader and issued a low command. "Use it."

Vader turned and left. He proceeded directly to Leia's chambers and pushed past the protocol droid who served as her attendant. His daughter was in her bath, her face scrubbed clean and her hair wet. She looked so young. And so much…like her mother.

"You." He said. "Are pregnant."

She sank lower in the water, until it lapped at her chin.

"The bounty hunter?"

"I haven't told him yet."

Her calm admission infuriated him. It could only be Fett, he was the only man she was permitted to see behind closed doors.

The request, strangely enough, had come from the bounty hunter, who asked to pay his respects. Vader would have refused it, if not for the rare flicker in emotion that he sensed from Leia the moment she laid eyes on Fett. It was the first time he glimpsed a crack in her walls.

It had something to do with Jabba's palace. That was all he knew. Whatever had passed between them before Fett's near-demise at the pit of Carkoon had forged some sort of wary understanding.

The bounty hunter was never easy to read either, but when Vader questioned him he was direct in his response. "She's lonely."

"You will report to me anything she says."

"As you wish. But we don't do a lot of talking."

He hoped it would help her accept her new life. It never occurred to him that she might not be taking precautions. "Your droid would have provided you with anything you required. With protection to prevent this."

"I know."

"You did this intentionally?"

"Yes."

"Do you love him?"

For the first time since her capture, Leia smiled. Her gaze drifted up to the ceiling. "I could love him. But it would be like loving a meteor. I didn't do this for him." She sat up, the water rippling out from around her bare shoulders. "I did it for you. To help you see what everyone, even the Emperor, has been waiting for you to see."

Vader could feel her now, rising in the Force, like a powerful surge of energy. "What do you mean?"

"The moment I turn, you become useless. The Emperor will kill you, or order me to kill you." She fixed her eyes on him, dark and serious. "If you want to rule this galaxy, it must be our family and our family alone. Father and daughter. Grandfather and grandchild. The Emperor is the one who has outlived his use."

"I cannot-"

"You couldn't before. But now that I'm here, you can." She settled back down into the water. "The Empress has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"


	35. Oola AND Leia Organa

_**Author's Note:** For this prompt I reused the AU from my Oola/Boba/Leia fic, _A Dangerous Habit _. Check it out if you want the backstory._

* * *

Even before she opens the door, Leia knows he's here. The walls are thin and she can hear it in Oola's laugh. His armor is stacked neatly by the door and the bounty hunter is sitting at the table clad in a loose shirt and pants.

"There you are," Oola says, turning from the caf maker as Leia enters. "You want some caf?"

"Just water." She grabs a glass and fills it before dropping into the chair opposite Boba Fett. "You're back."

"This time it's for work."

"And I'm certainly not complaining." Oola hands him a cup of caf, and Leia realizes she's taking the only other seat.

"I'll move-"

"No, you just got home. You've probably been on your feet all night. Rest."

Fett slides his chair back a little. "Sit with me," he offers and Oola situates herself on his lap with a fond grin. They both look very relaxed.

Leia wonders sometimes if she should be jealous, or if she should resent giving up the bed she shares with Oola whenever the bounty hunter shows up. But she doesn't, really. Oola has always made her feel loved and safe. Fett's not much for conversation or long-term companionship, but she gets the attraction. She has firsthand knowledge of it.

"What kind of work is it?" Leia asks him, not really expecting him to volunteer information.

"Something you might be able to help me with." He draws a holoprojector from his pants pocket and tosses it onto the table. A projection jumps to life, a young man with fair hair in ornate white robes. "Ever seen him around? Maybe at the club?"

Leia leans in. He's young and handsome, but there's something truly striking about his face. She almost feels as if she _has_ seen him before, but not on Malastare. On Tatooine maybe? She looks over at Oola, but the Twi'lek is shaking her head.

"To be honest, he looks a little fancy for our clientele."

"He's a prince," Fett acknowledges. "Alderaani. But he has friends in every corner of the galaxy. _Rebellious_ friends."

"Oooh." Oola seems amused by that. "Is there good money in traitors?"

"Very good."

"I'm not with the customers much," Leia tells the bounty hunter. "Sorry."

"Keep your eyes open." He scoops up his projector. "Oola says you got a promotion."

"Kind of. The backstage manager quit, so I'm filling in. I don't know if I'll get to keep it."

"You will if you keep after Geegot," Oola insists. "He needs someone back there. Someone the dancers actually like."

Leia shrugs and drinks the rest of her water. When she puts down the glass she catches the bounty hunter watching her and straightens. "What?"

His mouth twists slightly. "I'm still not used to seeing you with hair."

She smiles in return and and looks away, her fingers running self-consciously through the strands that now reach her chin. It suddenly feels too warm in here.

Fett tips his head back to address Oola. "How's the shower?"

"About the same. Don't expect to have hot water for long." She raises herself just enough to let him up and then takes his seat. She arches are brows at Leia questioningly. "Are you working tonight?"

"No. It's my off night. I might go down Vuusan's shop and pick up a few credits cleaning parts."

"You could do that. Or you could stay here and keep Boba company." Her friend gives her a meaningful look. "You don't need my permission. You know that, right?"

Leia can no longer blame the warmth in her cheeks on the room. "He hasn't-"

"Because he's waiting for you to. You need to be more aggressive, Miss Backstage Manager. Go get what you need."

" _Acting_ Backstage Manager," Leia shoots back. "And I don't _need_ him."

"Fine. You don't need _him_ , but you need a night off. You need some fun." Oola purses her lips. "I can get Loonah to switch shifts with me. How about we both stay with Boba tonight, drink some cheap beer and play chance cubes with the sonic races."

Leia looks over at the 'fresher door. The shower is still running. "Isn't he going to be looking for that prince?"

Something crosses Oola's face. A little chagrin and a touch of nervousness.

"Wait. You know him? Why did you lie?"

Oola leans over the table, her eyes intent and her voice low. "There's a lot more to the rebellion than scheming nobles. Lots of people just like you and me who want to see change in the galaxy. No more conquering systems and crushing their people. No more slavery. No more protection for thugs like Jabba."

Leia can only stare as Oola raises a finger to her lips in warning. The shower cuts off.

Oola reaches across the table, and her fingers twine with Leia's. "Let's stay in tonight. We need some fun. Boba needs some fun."

"I have plenty of fun." The 'fresher door opens. The bounty hunter is completely naked, his wet skin gleaming under the cheap yellow lights. "Your air dryer's clogged. Do you have a toolkit?"

"Uh. Maybe above the sink?" Leia can feel heat burning her cheeks like Tatooine's suns now. Fett moves past them and reaches up to retrieve the kit. _Fek_ , she shouldn't be staring at him. It's nothing she hasn't seen before, even if it was just once.

Oola's fingers squeeze hers. "We could have all kinds of fun tonight," she says slowly and deliberately.

"I have to work," the bounty hunter says on his way back to the 'fresher, tools in hand.

"We'll see about that," Oola calls back. She's so confident. Like she has everything under control.

And maybe she does. She is, after all, a dancer. Leia draws in a breath and squeezes her hand back. "Okay."


	36. Queen Trios

The queen's chamber was empty. It wasn't until Boba saw the draperies stir in the wind that he saw the open window.

There was a flat, narrow ledge outside the window with no railing. Snowflakes swirled around in the cold air, but Queen Trios sat on the edge in nothing but a silk robe, her long hair loose. She glanced back at him. "You don't like to wait, do you?"

"No." He stepped over the low sill of the window and looked over the edge. A long drop. Long enough to kill someone instantly.

A strand of hair blew across her face and she raised her hand to brush it away. It was a cybernetic replacement. A good one. "My guards?"

"Alive. Unconscious. Maybe a little bruised."

Her smile was as cold and as brittle as the air around them. "Lord Vader said you were efficient."

"I'm here to do a job."

"As am I." She turned her head to look up at him. "We share the same master, you and I. But I must say, I would rather have your job."

"It must be very hard," Boba returned coolly. "Living in a castle and ruling over a prosperous planet."

Trios laughed suddenly and sharply. "Yes. I'm queen of my own tomb." The wind kicked up, making the edges of her robe flutter. She closed her eyes and a shudder passed through her, but it wasn't a gesture of discomfort. In fact, Boba had the distinct impression that she was enjoying the biting cold on her skin.

"What's under that armor?" She asked, her eyes still shut. "A human? A man?"

"A man who doesn't like having his time wasted."

"Ah." Her eyes opened. "I suppose we should get on with it, shouldn't we? Our master will expect results. Could you give me a hand?"

Cautiously he planted his feet and offered his hand. The wind pulled at her robe as she stood, erasing any doubt that she wore nothing beneath it. They were standing very close on that perilous ledge, close enough that he could see the bright spark of interest in her eyes.

Vader should be careful with this one.


	37. Piett

He should have known that Bosco would back out, the cowardly little rat. Piett closed his commlink with more force than necessary and tucked it back into his jacket, conscious of the eyes that watched him from the shadowy corners of the bar.

This place was legendary at the Imperial Academy, legendary and notorious. The first-years talked about it in whispers while the third-years bragged about that one time when they went inside…they saw a contract killer drop a severed head on the table in front of his client. Swear to the gods. They all saw it.

Bosco was the one who suggested that they become the only second-years in their class to go. He was the one who pushed for it. "I'll meet you there," he'd said.

Piett considered leaving. But what if none of other cadets believed him? He should buy something, so he had a charge receipt for proof.

The bartender was a heavyset Dug with half-closed eyes. He didn't even look up when Piett approached. "Pardon me. Could I have-"

"You'll have to speak up."

The low, lightly accented voice caught him off guard. How exactly he'd managed to overlook a man in combat armor was unclear to Piett, but there he was. His hair was dark, his skin was tan. His nose had been broken at least once. They might be close in age, but something about his posture and the graveness of his expression spoke of a different kind of maturity.

"I'm sorry?" Piett said, more flustered than he would have liked.

"He can't hear you," the man said, laying his helmet on the bar. He reached across and waved a gloved hand in front of the bartender's face. The Dug slowly raised his head.

"Eeettt?"

"I'll have a cold Mantellian. He'll have the same."

Now Piett was really and truly uncomfortable, because even a small-word boy knew what it meant when a stranger wanted to buy him a drink. "No. Thank you."

"Suit yourself. I'll drink it if you won't."

"I'm not here for-"

"What are you here for?" The man leaned one arm on the bar, but the sharpness of his eyes betrayed the casual stance. "The view?"

Piett swallowed his discomfort and tried to sound confident. "I heard this was a place of business. Where…certain services might be acquired." He lowered his voice. "I'm sure you understand, I can't say more."

Something flickered in the man's eyes. Something light and warm. The corner of his mouth drew up just slightly and Piett realized too late that he was staring far too openly at another man's mouth. Thankfully the bartender shoved two chilled glasses at them, giving him something to do.

Ugh. Cheap whiskey. Well, he could hardly feel indebted over _that_.

"You heard right," the man said after taking a sip from his own glass. "Most of the barves in here are looking for work, and they have a wide range of expertise. Whatever you need. A false ID. A banned substance. Your dick sucked off."

Piett nearly choked. He quickly set his glass down and cleared his throat, still trying to play it cool. "And what about you? Are you looking for work?"

"I am."

"What kind of service do you provide?"

"I find people. People who try hard not to be found." Golden brown eyes locked onto his. "I've been known to suck dick too. Just not for credits."

It took Piett a few dizzy seconds to formulate a response to that. "I suppose, in your business, there's no such thing as being too forward."

The mercenary shrugged in response. "No room for subtext either. You want this or you don't."

Piett was beginning to suspect that he did, in fact, want this. "I wouldn't have thought I was your type."

The man took a step closer to him, his voice dropping into a near growl. "You're exactly my type. Look at you. Your _kriffing_ shirt is starched."

His hand smoothed over his chest self-consciously. "It's…regulation."

The man gazed back at him in silence for a second or two, then he tipped his glass up, finishing off his drink. "I'm going to wrinkle it."

Piett exhaled. "I believe you. Shall we go?"


	38. Riyo Chuchi

He's half-conscious when they haul him up to his knees, his arms imprisoned by the guards on either side of him. Bits and pieces of their conversation hangs over him like a fog as he desperately tries to orient himself.

"…working for the Appeasers…"

"…heard the whole…"

"…recorder in that helmet…"

"You're right," says a woman's voice, low and full of regret. "We can't let him leave."

Boba raises his head, and his visor picks her up on a facescan ID immediately. "Executing a prisoner," he sneers. "Not very senatorial of you."

Senator Riyo Chuchi gazes back him, her pale blue skin almost gray in the dim lighting of the corridor. "Pantora has become a different place since the Empire. I've had to learn a few new skills."

"Like treason?" It's probably not the smartest thing to say, but his head is still swimming from the stun blast and he just needs a little more time.

She's carrying a small blaster pistol in her hand, and it begins to hum as it charges. Her throat convulses, but her hands are steady. She doesn't want to do it. But she will.

"Wait," he says. "That won't penetrate my helmet. Unless you want me to die slowly."

"Remove his helmet," she addresses it to her guards, but Boba shakes his head.

"I'll have to do it."

She looks at him for a moment, and her golden eyes narrow. She points her blaster at his head, and then slowly lowers it until it the barrel is aimed at the unprotected space between his breastplate and his belt. An easy gut shot, and a slow, painful death. "Release his arms."

She's not taking any chances. He can respect that. He'll just have to make this work. Carefully he raises his hands and releases the lock on his helmet. Maybe he can get to the smoke grenade hidden in his knee-plate if he can trigger it unnoticed. He sets his helmet in front of his right knee before he raises his head.

"You're a clone," she says, a touch of breathlessness in her voice. She's surprised, but there's something else there. Maybe something he can use.

"I'm a soldier. In the Grand Army of the Repub- _Empire_." He makes his voice shake, just a little.

" _Kriff_." She mutters, looking down at her blaster. "One of your brothers used to serve as my escort on Coruscant. He said his name was 'Handsome.' He was probably joking, but that's what I called him."

It's a connection he needs, but it still makes his stomach roll. "I'm not him."

"I know. You are handsome, though. And so was he." Her chest rises and falls sharply, as if she's holding in a sigh. "More importantly, he was a good man. He deserved a better life than he was given…and so do you."

She definitely slept with her clone escort. Can he use that? "I'm…Gab," he offers, looking up into her golden eyes. "People say I talk too much."

A small smile curls the corners of her mouth. "I'm not your enemy, Gab."

"Senator," one of her guards says in an urgent tone.

Her eyes drop to her weapon, and she releases the charge. Silence replaces the hum, filling the dark corridor. "Get up," she tells him. "Come with me."

He rises on unsteady feet, his balance still off. "Leave your helmet," she commands, and Boba has to resist the urge to look at her. Is this a test? Gab the clonetrooper probably wouldn't care. He obeys, watching from the corner of his eye as one of her guards collects it.

He'll get it back. He just needs a little more time.


	39. Selestrine

**Author's Note:** _This is another obscure one. Selestrine is from a Legends EU comic called_ Boba Fett: Enemy of the Empire _. Selestrine is a seer whose disembodied head lives in a box and she is *very* pissed off about it._

* * *

Foresight is a funny thing. Most people, when they imagine what a seer sees, imagine that she sees the future like a holomovie in crystalline detail. The truth is far less glamorous. It comes in pulses, the knowledge, the feelings, the future of others. She can't control it. She can't chose what she knows.

She knows things about this bounty hunter, for example, the one who left her sitting here in the cargo bay of his ship. The one who has no interest in her gifts, only the monetary value of her life.

Her life such as it is. A head in a box, with no agency, no people, no home.

She thought she could bait him with her visions, perhaps anger him enough to kill her, but he expressly declined. The future doesn't interest him. His own death doesn't interest him.

Oh yes, she can see his death.

She can also see what he'll be doing two hours from now, which is masturbate quietly in his bunk before he falls asleep.

Not all of her visions are matters of destiny.

And the sad thing is, she's jealous of that mundane act in his near future. She remembers what it was like to have a body, to feel that shuddering heat and the blessed quiet in her mind during orgasm.

He'll have that, but he won't savor it way she would. It's a basic function for him, like a droid powering down. Release the endorphins and go to sleep. Stupid man.

She casts a baleful stare at the back of his helmeted head. He can concern himself only with credits because he has a body. A strong, well-formed, stupidly attractive body. If her own body was suddenly returned to her, she would would take him to that bunk and show him that credits are just pieces of plasticine.

Her mind catches on the memory of her last lover, on his sweat-damp skin against hers and the flash of his smile in the dark. Ah, Even'del. Such a good man.

He died with the rest of her people at the hands of Empire.

She closes her eyes, and when she opens them, her gaze returns to the bounty hunter. Credits do not die and leave you alone in this cruel galaxy. Who was it, she wonders, who died and turned his heart into a scale for cold credits?

It must have been someone very close to him. Someone he loved very much. If only she could see his past instead of his future. She could definitely convince him to kill her then.


	40. Qi'ra

"I was surprised to see you." The rumble of the fans in the armory nearly drowns out her words. It's the angle of her head that draws his attention, the turn that puts her face in profile as she refastens her shirt. "After what happened last time with Vos…"

Boba rises from his seat on a storage crate, his flightsuit still half-undone. "We made up."

Her dark brows arch upward. "And who groveled before whom?"

"No groveling. Vos is a practical man. I'm a practical man." He can feel her eyes on him as he fastens the suit under his chin and starts on his his armor. Maybe one day they'll make it to a bed. But not here. She's too closely watched and he can't afford to be careless.

"It's really quite remarkable, what you do." She says as she draws her cloak back over her shoulders. "You stand alone. I can't decide if that's admirable or foolish."

"You're surrounded by people who would kill you in a second if it benefited them. What's that?"

"Security. They know I would do the same." She lifts her chin and meets his eyes.

He likes her. Probably too much. Before he puts his helmet on he kisses her again. She tastes like sweat and musk and the bright paint on her lips. "I'll be back."

She hooks her fingers around his as he steps back and brings them to her lips. Maybe she can still smell herself, even through his gloves. "You'd better."


	41. Krennic

"I suppose you're off to your next job."

He's making conversation. Fett recognizes this and processes within the shelter of his helmet. He takes his time adding it up carefully with everything else he knows about Orson Krennic.

He didn't do this the last time Fett completed a job for him. But he's a relatively new client, and certainly a profitable one. There are no shortage of beings in the galaxy eager to avoid him. And he's ambitious. Enough to catch the attention of Vader, who once referred to him sneeringly as a man "who doesn't know what he truly wants."

What does he want? To pass the time with a bounty hunter whose face he's never seen?

"If you're finished with me," he replies, and watches carefully as the Imperial commander looks away and suppresses a small, thin smile.

"It wouldn't be fair to keep you."

"When is this galaxy ever fair?"

Krennic's pale blue eyes fix on his helmet. "Well put."

Well, now they're flirting. To what end, Fett is less certain. Krennic a good-looking man surrounded by eager young Imperials, many of whom would gladly suck his cock. He's looking for something different here.

The commander takes a step toward him, a flush creeping up above his immaculately starched collar. "You're quite merciless in your work. I appreciate that. Does that quality carry over to other aspects of your life?"

It's a _kriffing_ stupid idea, of course. Getting involved with a client always is. But Fett is curious. If Krennic sees fit to trust him with some highly personal information, it could be useful at a later date. If nothing else, Vader might find it…valuable.

"Occasionally," he says, tilting his helmet to one side. Krennic receives the gesture with a long, slow inhalation.

"Then perhaps you could stay a little longer." The commander lowers his eyes, and Fett allows himself a moment of imagination, an exploration of what a pressed and polished man like Krennic might truly want. Nothing really dangerous. Nothing that would put himself at risk.

He'd make a nice footstool, though.

"As you wish."


	42. Asajj Ventress

It felt like waking up, except that his eyelids weighed about the same as a baby Wookiee and he was only seventy percent sure he was awake.

Through the fog he managed to identify some sort of crude medbay, the whirring and beeping on medical equipment, and the raw, torn flesh of the man floating in this bacta tank with him.

Oh. Oh no.

The sarlacc. His jetpack. Solo…it all came rushing back, and one of the monitors to his left began to beep frantically.

A slender, white-skinned hand appeared, hovering over his face. The beeping abruptly stopped.

"You're awake," said a voice so hauntingly familiar that he almost disregarded the statement as false. Ventress. He turned his head with some effort and stared at the Dathomirian standing beside the tank.

She looked the same, but then again she didn't. She had hair, for one thing, soft, silver hair framing her angular features. "Here," she said, offering him a long, flexible tube. There was clear fluid inside of it. He took the tube between his lips and sucked water until she took it away. "One step at a time, Boba. Can you speak?"

His throat ached and his mouth felt sticky. "Thought…you were dead."

"Death is a slippery thing, for some of us. You died last night, not for the first time. The droid had to shock you back to life. I almost told him not to bother."

"Why…helping me?"

"You helped me once, when I was down and out. Consider this repayment."

"Young…and stupid." And he was infatuated with her, something the ex-Sith undoubtedly knew.

She looked down at him with hooded eyes, and her mouth pursed slightly. "You were looking for someone to remind you of home. I don't look as much like them now, do I?"

"No."

"You, on the other hand-"

"Look…like my father?"

"I was going to say like a slab of raw meat." She met his eyes. "You have a long recovery ahead of you. It won't be pleasant."

From the little he could see of his ravaged body, he knew she was right. But as long as freedom awaited on the other side… "Need to get…back to work."

She blinked, long and slow, and then laid a hand on his chest, just above the surface of the bacta. His armor had kept most of his skin there intact. "I gave you a second chance. But the path you take from this place if your choice. I hope you will choose a better path."

"Ha." His throat strained to produce the sound, and his chest rose and fell with effort. Her hand remained. "You sound…like a Jedi, Ventress."

"Shut up, you ungrateful wretch." Her tone was dry, her words had no venom in them. "It is never too late to choose a different path. Perhaps even a less lonely one." She withdrew her hand and touched two fingers to her lips before waving them languidly over his head. "Rest for now."


End file.
